


Something Wicked This Way Comes

by priorwalter



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Adam Parrish Loves Ronan Lynch, Established Relationship, Joseph Kavinsky is His Own Warning, Kidnapping, M/M, Ronan Lynch Loves Adam Parrish, Ronan-Level Swearing, Suicide, Wordcount: Over 100.000
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-02
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2020-04-06 17:48:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 78,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19067584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/priorwalter/pseuds/priorwalter
Summary: Adam Parrish, nearly finished his first year at Harvard, meets Richard Campbell Gansey III, a curious man with a nose for magic. After the reappearance of someone from Mr. Gray's chequered past, they flee to the Barns where something wicked brews in Cabeswater's depths.♕Adam and Ronan struggle with growing up. Oh, and a magical forest turning against them.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, dear readers, this fic has been my baby for the past seven months and I am very excited to finally share it with you. 
> 
> Some housekeeping notes: the chapters start out short, but they do get longer as the fic goes on. Second, if you're worried about the 'kidnapping' and 'suicide' tags, they are both very minor. Last, updates will be weekly on Sundays.
> 
> This fic is nearly completely written. Currently, I have about 90k words written and about 10-15k to go, so if all goes to plan, so there won't be any hiatuses. It's looking to be about 22ish chapters. I'm hoping to get this all published before CDTH comes out, so updates might start coming faster near the end.

Adam Parrish never imagined “psychic” would be a job he could put on his resume, but here he is, offering a tarot reading for a guy wearing a polo shirt so bright Adam might go blind from it. The guy shakes Adam’s hand, and introduces himself as, “Richard Campbell Gansey III, but you can call me Gansey.” He looks like he was pulled straight out of a brochure advertising Aglionby, sans the uniform. He’s the type of person who truly belongs at Harvard, with his boat shoes and tousled hair and old-fashioned glasses that should be ugly, but serve only to make him more attractive. Adam supposes he signed up for this when he applied for an ivy league, but seeing his peers drowning in money while Adam is simply drowning hasn’t gotten any easier since he left Aglionby. The only thing out of place on this boy is the worn out leather notebook carefully clutched in his hands.

 

Adam hasn’t even reached for his tarot deck before Call-Me-Gansey interrupts, “I hope this isn’t terribly rude, but I’m not here for a reading. I was actually wondering if you knew anything about energy?” Adam does find this rude, and when he takes too long to respond, Call-Me-Gansey’s fingers drum on the notebook. He adds, “Do ley lines mean anything to you?”

 

Adam feels a cold shiver run up his spine. “Who are you?” His words are sharp and curt, his voice acidic. Last time he’d heard of anyone searching for for a ley line was just under two years previous, when someone had tried to sacrifice Adam to wake one. Of course, Adam had sacrificed himself for the ley line anyway, but that’s beside the point. Adam wishes Ronan were here.

 

Gansey frowns. “I don’t mean to offend you. I know you deal in energy work, and I’ve heard from reliable sources you’re the real deal.” When Adam fails to reply, he says, a hint of awkwardness creeping into his voice, “I can go, if you want?”

 

If Ronan were here, he’d have kicked Gansey out of the room as soon as the words _ley line_ were uttered, but Adam is as intrigued as he is unsettled. What does a Harvard student, rich beyond belief and polished like marble, want with ley lines? Magic isn’t the sort of science they teach at this school. So Adam says, “Why are you interested in ley lines?”

 

Gansey beams. It feels like like Adam’s fallen into a trap, but he can’t detect a hint of malice in Gansey’s face. “I collect historical and magical artefacts, which as you probably know, almost always lie on ley lines. I’ve been searching for one for years, but it’s almost impossible to pinpoint the exact location.”

 

Before the words can keep tumbling out of his mouth at a thousand miles per hour, Adam interrupts with an unimpressed stare, “I’m glad you have the luxury of being casually interested in ley lines, but I can’t help you.”

 

Gansey frowns again. “You know something you’re not telling me.”

 

Adam says cryptically, “You don’t know what you’re looking for.”

 

“So why don’t you tell me?” Gansey’s professional facade betrays no emotion, though Adam is sure he’s burning with desperation just below the surface.

 

“I think it’s time for you to leave now.” Adam smiles and stands up. Gansey mirrors the action and sticks his hand out for Adam to shake it, but Adam lets him drop his hand awkwardly after a few tense seconds.

 

“It was nice to meet you, Adam.” Gansey says courteously. “I’m sorry for any inconvenience I’ve caused you.” Adam wonders how many people are stuffed under his refined exterior.

 

“You too, Richard Campbell Gansey III.” He replies unnecessarily, only because it seems a Persephone sort of thing to say. Gansey shuts the door softly behind him on his way out, and Adam collapses onto the tiny couch he shares with his roommate. He considers calling Ronan, but the encounter with Gansey has perturbed him. Nothing about Gansey had seemed suspicious. Adam is sure he was telling the truth, but he can’t involve someone else with the ley line and keep a sound conscience. Adam and Ronan hadn’t had much of a choice when their lives became intertwined with the ley line, and no matter how honest Gansey had seemed, Adam wouldn’t lead an innocent scholar into business more dangerous than he could ever expect. (Well, Adam _had_ chosen to give himself over to the ley line - but he’d had no way of knowing what that entailed. And Ronan, well. He’d been born into magic; he was part of it, whether or not he wanted to be.)

 

Adam suddenly notices that Gansey left his notebook. It’s well worn and well loved, clearly. It’s filled with newspaper clippings and drawings and maps. After rifling through the messy pages, Adam quickly realizes there’s nothing in it he doesn’t already know, and more importantly, there’s nothing that could lead Gansey to Henrietta. He doesn’t want to return it, but he knows if he doesn’t, Gansey will come back, and Adam would prefer to have the upper hand if he has to speak to Gansey again. He tosses the notebook aside. He’ll do it later.

 

Abruptly, Adam is hit with a burning-hot sensation of homesickness. He supposes some of it is Cabeswater, the magical forest of Ronan’s dreams situated on top of the ley line, calling to him, but there was so much more: seeing Ronan every day, playing with Opal, Blue and Maura and the beautiful chaos of 300 Fox Way. He misses the Barns and Matthew Lynch and the lazy, lethargic heat and the familiarity of working at Boyd’s and God, he wants to go home.

 

Luckily, he only has a week left in Massachusetts; He’s just finished his last exam, and now he works for one more week at his internship before he can leave for Henrietta for the summer. As his return home grows closer, he misses Ronan like he’d miss a lost limb. He still doesn’t want to call him, though, not while Gansey’s visit is fresh in his mind. He probably should be packing, but that’s not really an option, either; he knows he’d just be torn up over what Gansey wants with the ley line, what might happen if he found it.

 

Also, collectors of “historical and magical artefacts” usually spell danger for Ronan. Niall Lynch had the ability to pull objects from his dreams, and he used his powers selfishly. Eventually, it killed him. Adam can’t bear the thought of Ronan, who has the same abilities, being put into danger because of someone finding out about his ability. This only solidifies Adam’s belief in his earlier sentiment: Gansey doesn’t know what he’s looking for. He doesn’t know the true nature of magic. He only wants to know, and Adam knows all too well that knowledge is a weapon sharper than any knife.

 

♕

 

Ronan is, as expected, unhappy when Adam tells him about Gansey’s strange visit.

 

“There’s no way for him to know anything about Cabeswater, or you or Opal or anything, Ronan,” Adam (futilely, he knows) tries to assure his boyfriend, and himself if he’s being honest.

 

Ronan snorts. “You don’t know what kind of people are out there. He’s probably a lying freak who wants to stuff you and keep you in a glass case to add to his creepy basement of magic artefacts or whatever the fuck it was.” There’s a pregnant pause, and Adam knows Ronan is thinking of his father. “Be careful, Adam.” It’s barely above a whisper.

 

“I know, dumbass. I will.” The need to have Ronan close enough to touch is overwhelming, and Ronan seems to feel it too.

 

“Seven days,” he says, and it sounds like a promise. “I keep waking up and expecting to find you there, but…” Ronan trails off, so Adam replies haughtily, “I knew you only wanted me in your bed, you tart.” Which means, _I miss you too_.

 

Ronan scoffs. “Did you really think I’d like your winning personality, Parrish?” Which means, _I love you_.

 

It’s just then Adam’s roommate walks in. “Hey, Noah,” Adam says loudly, mostly to subtly let Ronan know they can’t talk about Cabeswater, lest Noah hear them. He’s not really sure if Noah has any friends to tell anyway, but it feels mean to assume something like that.

 

Noah waves his hand vaguely. “Don’t stop your phone sex on my account.”

 

Adam rolls his eyes, and Ronan shouts through the phone, “You’re welcome to join us, Czerny.” Adam holds the phone away from his ear.

 

“You’re going to make me deaf in my good ear, asshole,” Adam gripes, but his fond voice contradicts the sharp words.

 

“Good, you dick. It would give me more quality phone sex time with my boyfriend Noah.” Ronan retorts, and Adam laughs. It feels good to talk to Ronan. It’s nice to feel normal after the Gansey business; he hasn’t had to truly worry about ley lines and energy and magic for nearly a year, and it’s been grating at him.

 

Adam walks to his room for more privacy, and after those few seconds of silence, Ronan mutters, “Fuck, are you jealous of Czerny? I don’t have to remind you of that time I threw him out a window, right?”

 

“I was just going to my room, dick.” Adam snorts. After a pause, he sighs miserably. “I want to come home. I don’t want to work. I’m tired, Ronan.” He feels like a child. He can handle one more week at his internship, but hearing Ronan’s voice, it seems impossible.

 

“Just a few more days,” Ronan murmurs, and they fall silent, but Adam doesn’t want to hang up. He’s basking in the silence when–

 

“MOTHERFUCKER, OPAL, LEAVE CHAINSAW ALONE, I SWEAR TO GOD— I have to go, Opal is trying to eat Chainsaw again. Love y— GET BACK HERE, LITTLE SHIT—” Then the line goes dead. Adam can’t help but smile. He never thought he’d miss Opal and Chainsaw’s quasi sibling rivalry, but he finds himself yearning to be there to witness it.

 

His mind inexplicably turns back to Gansey. Something about him is bothering Adam, but he can’t pinpoint what is. It had been nice, almost, to find someone who knew about ley lines who wasn't looking for them for their own purposes (at least, as far as Adam knows). He remembers, distantly, when he and Ronan has seen it like that: a thrilling chase for something _more_ , searching for answers in a magical forest where time ran in circles and the trees talked back. But then Neeve had tried to sacrifice Adam to the ley line, and the wonder was gone. It would be unwise to introduce someone else to the ley line, even an innocent scholar. So why do Adam’s thoughts keep wandering back to him?

 

Noah pushes Adam’s door open, interrupting his thoughts. “Why do you have Gansey’s notebook?” He asks curiously. “This is like, his child.”

 

“You know Gansey?” Adam’s eyes widen. Noah has friends? And one of them is _Gansey_?

 

Noah nods. “We’re friends.” Which is a rather vague answer, but Adam expects nothing less from his roommate.

 

“He came in for a reading and left it here,” Adam admits, for some reason unable to meet Noah’s eyes. “I was going to give it back, but I’m not sure where he lives.”

 

Noah grins. “I do!” He gives Adam directions to Gansey’s dorm and before Adam can thank him, he disappears.

 

Weird.

 

Adam, with nothing better to do, makes his way to Gansey’s place. He knocks on the door, and when there’s no answer, he calls out, “Gansey? You left your journal in my dorm.” Before he’s even finished his sentence, there’s a loud _thump_ and then scuffling. Adam throws the door open to find Gansey pointing a gun in a trembling grip at a man with cunning blue eyes.

 

♕

 

Gansey shuts the door of the psychic’s room quietly, but he dearly wants to slam it. The frustration that’s always simmering in the back of his mind, the forbidden thought that he’ll never find the ley line, rears its ugly head. He knows Adam Parrish owes Gansey nothing, but God, it had been so close Gansey could almost touch it. He wonders what kind of experience Adam has with energy. What could have happened to give him such a visceral reaction at even hearing the words _ley line_? Gansey has met plenty of people who have had strange experiences on ley lines, maybe Adam is one of them. It’s the only explanation he can come up with, but it sounds weak, even in his head. Adam is psychic, or at the very least claims to be, so he must have more experience with magic than one bad encounter.

 

This is going to keep Gansey up all night.

 

He calls Henry.

 

“Hello, paramour.” Henry says as soon as he answers, and Gansey can already feel his mood improving. “Have you spoken to that psychic fellow yet?”

 

Gansey sighs. “Yes. He knows about ley lines, but seems to think they’re dangerous. He wouldn’t tell me anything.”

 

“I’d come and rough him up a little, but I’m afraid I am rather indisposed at the moment.” Henry replies delicately, and Gansey laughs at just the thought of Henry beating someone up.

 

“What could you possibly be doing that is more important than me?”

 

Gansey can _hear_ Henry’s impish grin. “Well, darling,” he purrs, “while I would rather be doing you, I must pick my mother up from the airport.”

 

“Henry, I am in public!” His voice goes up an octave, and Henry laughs, loud and genuine. Gansey can’t wait to go home and see him.

 

After a brief silence, Henry says thoughtfully, “I think you should talk to the psychic again. I’m sure he’ll crack beneath your charming personality and shockingly good looks.” He pauses, and Gansey knows he’s searching for the right words, which is so often difficult for Henry. “You’ll figure it out, Gansey. One reticent psychic can’t stop you from pursuing your dreams.”

 

Gansey smiles. Henry always cheers him up. They talk until Gansey reaches his dorm, and he’s only just hung up when he opens his door to find a man standing there, pointing a gun at his head.

 

“Hello, Gansey. It’s a pleasure to meet you.” The man’s piercing aquamarine eyes are sharp as flint. “Please shut the door behind you.”

 

Gansey does.

 

“You may be wondering why I’m here. I am not a student here, though I do look it.” He smiles wickedly. “I am a collector, just like you, Dick. _I_ am interested in why _you_ are so interested in ley lines.” Gansey can barely process the man is saying. The gun hovering at point blank range from his head is rather distracting. “What the fuck are ley lines, anyway? What does a bland history major want with magic, hm?” The arm holding the gun does not shake or waver. The man raises an eyebrow at him with an ornery expression plastered on his unfairly attractive face. “Do you know what the Greywaren is, Richard?” When Gansey once again fails to reply, the man stage-whispers, “I do. What I don’t know is _where_ the Greywaren is, but I do know that _you_ can help me with that. Willing cooperation is encouraged, but not required.” Gansey blanches further.

 

“What do you want?” He manages to choke out past the lump in his throat. He feels like he’s ten again and he’s just stepped on a hornet’s nest. Every sensation feels amplified by his fear; he can feel the sweat crawling slowly down the back of his neck, he can feel his hands trembling, he can feel the gun floating just before his forehead. He can feel the possibility of death hanging over his head. He wonders hysterically if Henry’s mother will make it home safe from the airport. He wonders if he’ll ever see Henry again.

 

“You know what I want. Tell me where the Greywaren is, and no one gets hurt.” The man smiles pleasantly, as if he’s asking Gansey about the weather or a recent test instead of threatening him with murder.

 

“I don’t know what that is, I swear.” His voice trembles embarrassingly. His glasses slip down his nose, but he doesn’t push them back up. If he moves, he might end up with a bullet in his skull.

 

The man frowns as if Gansey has just kicked his puppy. “I was hoping you’d be cooperative.” He clicks off the safety on the gun. “But I guess we’ll have to do this the hard way.”

 

Gansey wonders if there is any possible way for him to get out of this. The man seems to have no qualms about murder, and Gansey has no way to incapacitate him.

 

There is a knock at the door. Gansey wonders if God is real after all. The man rolls his eyes, but does not move. “Gansey?” Adam Parrish’s voice rings out. “You left your journal in my dorm.” Gansey, however, is not focused on Adam. The man holding the gun is, for a fraction of a second, distracted by the voice on the other side of the door. Gansey uses this sliver of time to hit the gun as hard as he possibly can. It flies across the room, and the look in the man’s eyes screams _murder_. Gansey dives for the gun and reaches it a heartbeat before the other man. He turns it on the man, but before either of them can move, Adam throws open the door. Gansey hopes Adam’s mistrust of him won’t cause him to wildly misread this situation, and it appears luck is on his side, because without a moment of hesitation, he knocks the strange man down. They tussle for a few seconds before Adam delivers a hard blow to the head. The man is out cold. Then, Adam takes the gun from Gansey, pockets it, and books it out of the room, gesturing for Gansey to follow.

 

They don’t stop running until they reach Adam’s door, earning some strange looks from passersby. Adam locks the door behind them and takes a minute to catch his breath before demanding, “Who was that?” A southern accent draws out his vowels.

 

“I don’t know.” Gansey bites out, too frazzled to keep up his polite persona. “He came into my room, asking about ley lines, and something called the Greywaren—”

 

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” Adam interrupts. His accent is more controlled now, but his face is the picture of unbridled fury. “Does he know what the Greywaren is?”

 

“He said he did, but he doesn’t know where.” A thought strikes Gansey suddenly. “Do _you_ know where the Greywaren is? That man threatened me with some unpleasant business if I didn’t tell him where it was, and I’d rather like it if I could prevent that.”

 

Adam’s face manages to grow more incensed. “No.” It sounds like a lie.

 

“I’m very sorry, but if you know where it is, it would be very useful in maintaining my status as not dead.” Gansey retorts, feeling himself get a little flustered. “I have had a very trying experience, and I would like it if you would try to understand my point of view, Adam.”

 

Adam deflates suddenly. He crumples onto the tiny couch behind him. “ _Th_ _at man_ has no idea what the Greywaren is, and you know even less than he does. I might know who that was, and he isn’t someone who should have that much power. I’m sorry he threatened you, but I’d rather die than give him what he wants.”

 

Gansey somehow knows that Adam means every word.

 

“Thank you for saving my life, Adam. I know we had an… inauspicious first meeting, but I hope I can fix that.” He feels awkward, suddenly; he has no idea what to do in this sort of situation. “What do we do now?”

 

“I have to make a call.” Adam says, and pulls an ancient-looking phone out of his pocket. Whoever’s on the other end of the line picks up after three rings. “Hi, Blue— yes, it’s nice to talk to you too, but I have to talk to Mr. Gray, sorry— yes, it’s very important, I don’t care if you walk in on your mother and him, I’ve just had a near-death experience— why is he there? He hates your house. Tell him— Hi Ronan, I really have to talk to Mr. Gray, I’ll explain after, I promise— fuck off, this is important— thank you.” There’s a pause, and Adam says, “What does Colin Greenmantle look like?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed! Please comment, kudos, etc. I'd love to hear what you thought, or what you think might happen next! I love hearing from you. You can find me on tumblr @ morittz.tumblr.com!
> 
> Up next:  
>  
> 
> _Gansey immediately notices two things about Ronan. Number one: his tattoo. It covers most of his back and is a marvel of intricate design that Gansey would compliment, were it not for number two, the fact that the man attached to the tattoo looks to be the personification of a raincloud, waiting to pour on anyone who dares stay exposed for too long._


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now that the CDTH teaser is out, I just thought I'd let you know that this fic has no references to any CDTH spoilers. Mostly because it was like 90% written before any of it came out but also I don't plan on reading any of it until the actual book release.

The Gray Man tells Adam that Greenmantle is a handsome young man with bright aquamarine eyes. The Gray Man also tells Adam that he better call back soon, because Blue looks murderous and Ronan is about ready to strangle him. Adam wishes him good luck with surviving his boyfriend and hangs up.

 

“We’re in danger.” Adam says simply. There’s about a hundred thousand thoughts running through his head all at once, but all he can think about is Ronan.

 

“Who is Colin Greenmantle?” Gansey asks dazedly. He looks like he could sleep for a year, at least. “He said he collected artefacts, like me. He kept asking about ley lines.”

 

Adam raises an eyebrow. _I told you so_. “I told you it was dangerous, but it’s too late now. He knows everything about you, he probably has a sniper sitting in your parent’s backyard.” It’s a joke, but Gansey frowns. “Do you have anywhere you can go that’s not home?”

 

Gansey’s eyes fall. “I was going to stay with my boyfriend, but I wouldn’t want to drag him into this. Or my family, for that matter.”

 

Smart move. Though Adam knew it was inevitable, he’s slightly surprised at himself when he says, “You can stay with me.”

 

Gansey looks up. “I don’t want to inconvenience your family. I can pay you, if you—”

 

“No,” Adam snaps. “Don’t pay me. And I don’t live with my family.” He sighs. “ _And_ I have to stay here for another week.” Gansey pales, and Adam fights back the Ronan-like urge to roll his eyes. “I know you can’t stay here for a whole week, don’t worry. I’ll have someone from home come pick you up.”

 

Gansey musters up a smile. “Thank you so much, Adam. I’m sorry you’ve been roped into this.”

 

He snorts. “I was already there.” Gansey looks at him oddly, but he doesn’t elaborate. “I have to talk to my boyfriend. Make yourself at home.”

 

Adam shuts the door to his room and collapses onto his bed and sighs. What has he gotten himself into?

 

He calls Ronan, who picks up instantly. In between Ronan’s bursts of cursing and yelling at Blue to _shut the fuck up, you can have a turn with Adam later_ , he explains what happened. Once he’s reached the end of the story, Ronan is suspiciously silent.

 

“What’s wrong, Ronan?”

 

“He’s going to have to stay here, isn’t he.” When Ronan says it, it’s a statement, not a question.

 

Adam sighs. “Yeah. I’m sorry.”

 

Ronan scoffs. “It’s not your fucking fault. He shouldn’t have been messing with shit he doesn’t know anything about. That’s how people end up dead.” The name _Niall Lynch_ stays unspoken. “It’ll be a damn miracle if the shitbox survives the day.” If Ronan were talking to anyone else, they’d have to fight tooth and nail to get him to do this for them, but Adam is the exception. The thought cheers him up.

  
Adam lowers his voice on the off chance Gansey is listening. “I wish he had somewhere to go that wouldn’t lead him directly to the ley line. And you.”

 

“Yeah, well, no use wishing,” Ronan murmurs. “Do you think it would freak him out if I brought Chainsaw in the car with me?”

 

“You can’t trap a raven in a car for twenty hours!” Adam cries, and Ronan laughs, and Adam can almost forget everything that’s going on. That is, until Ronan says, “Do you think Gansey will mind the thin walls here? I was really looking forward to an empty house with you.”

“I can’t believe you’re thinking about that _now_ , I just almost died, Ronan,” Adam hisses, but he can’t stop smiling.

 

Ronan huffs. “That’s kind of a turn-off, Parrish.”

 

Adam sighs fondly. “Hey, why are you at Fox Way, anyway? You hate it there.”

 

Ronan pauses. “I should hope you know by now that Blue isn’t my type, dumbass. First of all, she has a v—”

 

“Okay, okay, shut up, asshole.” Adam interjects before Blue decides she’ll kill Ronan once and for all. Ronan’s subtle deflection means he’s he’s either hiding something, or he’s embarrassed to be caught willingly hanging out with Blue. He suspects it’s the latter.

 

“I’m gonna go get Opal and drive her back here and then I’ll be on my way.” There’s a pregnant pause. “Don’t die before I get there, motherfucker.”

 

“Love you too. Tell Opal I say hi.” Adam hangs up and groans. He’d been looking forward to a normal, peaceful summer with no more magic than usual, but nothing comes easily, a lesson Adam has learned time and time again.

 

When he leaves his room, Gansey is lying on the tiny couch, staring into nothing. He sits up hastily, eyes wide. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude.”

 

Adam shakes his head. “Don’t worry. You’re going to have to sleep there tonight, unless you feel like going back to your room. We can go get your stuff tomorrow morning before you leave, if you’d like?”

 

Gansey nods gratefully. “That would be nice. I’m sorry to put you out of your way like this, Adam.” He looks absolutely miserable for a second before the fragment of emotion disappears, making way for a polite, bland half-smile.

 

“I’m going to go take a nap. My roommate Noah might turn up at some point, don’t worry about him,” Adam says.

  
Gansey smiles a real smile this time. “Oh, Noah Czerny?”

 

Adam nods. “Wake me up if any criminals hold you at gunpoint again.” Gansey doesn’t laugh, but Adam couldn’t give a shit if he tried. He deserves to nap for at least a hundred years.

 

♕

 

Adam emerges from his room while Gansey and Noah are locked in a staring contest. Gansey wants to say hello, but he can’t risk a distraction. Noah has a supernaturally solemn stare, and Gansey won’t be the first to blink or break their eye contact. It’s a matter of pride at this point.

  
“Ronan’s coming tonight.” This seems to be directed at Noah, so Gansey doesn’t feel the need to look away.

 

Noah, without changing his otherworldly expression, cries out happily, “Nice! When?”

 

“He’ll probably get here around one tonight,” Adam replies casually, and Gansey looks up. Noah laughs at his loss, but the fun is gone now.

 

“One in the morning?” He demands, eyes wide. “We could have waited.”

 

Adam shrugs. “It’s okay. Ronan likes driving. And I was under the assumption that you’d like to get out of here as soon as possible.” Gansey can’t dispute that, but he still feels guilty.

 

“Have you talked to Ronan yet, Gansey?” Noah asks lightly, and Adam elbows him.

 

“No, why?” Gansey replies, ever polite. It feels like bait, but Gansey can’t just ask if something’s wrong with the boyfriend of the person who just saved his life. Besides, if Adam is dating him, he must be pleasant, right?

 

“No reason,” Adam assures him, and Noah rolls his eyes. Adam sticks his tongue out at his roommate, and then seems to remember Gansey is there and sombers. Not for the first time today and not for the last, Gansey feels intensely guilty about the burden he has put upon Adam. He wonders how long he’ll have to stay with him for the summer, if he’ll have to keep running from Greenmantle forever.

 

Suddenly, something occurs to Gansey. “Are we going to call the police about Greenmantle? Or at least tell someone?”

 

Adam’s easy expression turns sharp and dark. “No. You don’t know what he’s capable of.”

 

Gansey backs off.

 

The rest of the night passes without excitement; Noah and Adam bicker and joke and talk like nothing’s wrong, and Gansey wonders if this is normal for them. Adam is rather unruffled by the whole situation, and Noah seems unflappable anyway. He feels out of place, caught between the easy camaraderie of the two roommates and the gravity of the events that had transpired earlier. He needs to talk to Henry, but he dropped his phone in his room and he doesn’t want to ask if he can use someone else’s; he’s asking for so much already.

 

Soon enough, Adam and Noah bid him goodnight, and Gansey is left alone on the tiny couch. He knows sleep will be impossible tonight. He failed to mention his insomnia to Adam, though, which is why he assumes Gansey is asleep when he creeps out of the room to let someone in, presumably the mysterious Ronan. It’s too dark to make out much more than a tall, looming figure and close-cropped hair before Gansey quickly shuts his eyes because they’re kissing. He feels his face burst into flame and stays carefully still so they don’t notice he’s not sleeping. Luckily, they retreat to Adam’s room.

 

Gansey manages to get in an hour of sleep. He wakes up to find Adam padding around the tiny kitchenette, but before he can say anything, Ronan emerges (shirtless, Gansey observes) from Adam’s room, wraps his arms around Adam’s waist, and tucks his chin onto Adam’s shoulder.

 

Gansey immediately notices two things about Ronan. Number one: his tattoo. It covers most of his back and is a marvel of intricate design that Gansey would compliment, were it not for number two, the fact that the man attached to the tattoo looks to be the personification of a raincloud, waiting to pour on anyone who dares stay exposed for too long.

 

Ronan releases his boyfriend and turns to Gansey. When he finds him staring, he bares his teeth in a way that reminds Gansey of a wild dog, or some sort of big cat waiting to pounce on its prey.

 

“Put a leash on your dog, Adam. He’s gonna bite someone.” Noah calls from where he’s materialized in his door frame.

 

Adam doesn’t move. “I’m not my boyfriend’s keeper.”

 

This makes Ronan, who is still staring unblinkingly at Gansey, smile. He raises an eyebrow, daring Gansey to say something, so he finally blurts out, “I’m sorry for making you drive all the way out here.”

 

Ronan puts on an overdramatic pout. “So am I.”

 

Gansey wonders how on Earth he’s going to survive eleven hours alone in a car with this man.

 

He’s starving, but Ronan seems to be on a mission to make Gansey as uncomfortable as possible without outright making out with Adam right in the kitchen. Adam is all but encouraging this behaviour, which makes Gansey think he’s in for a long summer if Ronan has anything to do with it. He supposes he and Henry are affectionate too, but public displays of such affection are not something Gansey is overly fond of. Noah, who has at some point migrated to the couch, whispers, “You’ll get used to it.”

 

Gansey replies, “I feel like I’m being hazed.”

 

Eventually, Adam shoves Ronan off of him, muttering something about, “Christ, Ronan, you have a one track mind.” He’s scrounged up cereal (Froot Loops) and milk (possibly expired). He holds it up to Gansey, whose stomach rumbles inopportunely. Adam raises an eyebrow. “Eat, and then we can go get your stuff.”

 

Gansey doesn’t know if Froot Loops have ever tasted so good. He tries to ignore how Adam and Ronan are constantly touching, but it’s very distracting. It’s a long breakfast. Noah doesn’t eat anything, which is unsurprising, but Gansey wishes he would so he could be less of a third wheel.

 

When Adam and Ronan have disappeared into Adam’s room, presumably to get dressed, Noah sits down beside him. “They’re not doing it on purpose, by the way.” Gansey assumes he’s talking about Adam and Ronan’s constant and intense couple-ness. “They’re just horribly disgusting all the time. It’s adorable. Also, Ronan might be trying to freak you out to see if you’re homophobic.”

 

Gansey splutters. Him! Homophobic! “I have a boyfriend!”

 

Noah laughs. “I know. Ronan doesn’t, though.”

 

Ronan comes out of the room, followed closely by Adam. “Are you ready?” Adam asks, and when Gansey nods, Ronan moves to the door. “You can afford to be away from me for twenty minutes, you know,” Adam says with one eyebrow cocked. His voice is brimming with affection. “We’re freaking Gansey out.”

 

Ronan sneers. “Sure thing, genius. I’d let you go somewhere you almost got fucking _murdered_ yesterday, alone, when I’m right here.”

 

This appeases Adam. As the three of them walk out the door, Adam bats his eyelashes and says, voice dripping with sarcasm, “My knight in shining armour.”

 

It’s a long walk to his dorm.

 

Gansey is sad to find his notebook, dropped by Adam in the tussle, missing. On the plus side, his phone is still lying on the ground, almost dead but not damaged. He has a few missed calls from Henry and more than a few text messages, but he makes himself wait until they’re done packing to call him back. Ronan is surprisingly cooperative in spite of his apparent disinclination for being helpful or kind, but Gansey doesn’t comment. Soon, they’re finished, and it only takes a few trips to carry Gansey’s belongings from his dorm to Ronan’s tiny, ugly car, affectionately called the “Hondayota”.

 

Gansey gets in the passenger seat to allow Adam and Ronan a few moments of privacy to say goodbye partly as a kindness to them, but mostly so he doesn’t witness anything unsavory. After what feels like an eternity, Ronan gets in the car. He slams the door, expression screaming murder. He’s about to turn on his music, but Gansey stops him. “I’m going to call my boyfriend.”

 

Ronan grunts in acknowledgement. When Henry answers, he sounds like he’s just woken up. “Gansey! Where have you been?” His words are casual, but his voice betrays his desperation.

 

“It’s a long story.” He exhales heavily. “But I’ve got an eleven hour car ride ahead of me, so we have time.”

 

♕

 

After a long and harried conversation with his boyfriend, Gansey hangs up. “Sorry about that,” he says regretfully. “You can put on your music now.”

 

Ronan smiles sharply. Gansey’s in for one hell of a ride. He doesn’t comment on the bass-thumping electronic music, which Ronan appreciates. He supposes he could have chosen something softer; he has plenty of mixtapes made by and for Adam lying around, but it’s fun to watch Gansey dutifully brave what he must think is awful noise for the sake of politeness.

 

For more than an hour, Gansey seems to be warring with himself: his unwillingness to engage Ronan, versus his obvious proclivity for polite smalltalk. Finally, his manners win out; he says, “Where are we going, exactly?”

 

“Middle of fucking nowhere, Virginia,” Ronan replies breezily, perversely enjoying the way Gansey starts at the expletive.

 

“Thank you very much,” Gansey replies drily, staring out at the open road. “Your tattoo is beautiful, by the way,” he adds, a non-sequitur clearly spoken to quell the unbearable awkwardness. “Does it mean anything?”

 

“Fuck if I know,” Ronan snaps. His tattoo is a little too close to home for a near-stranger. He can almost hear the gears turning in Gansey’s head: _How did_ Adam _end up with someone like Ronan?_ This is a question that is asked often and by many, but usually, Ronan couldn’t give less of a shit. Sometimes, it’s fun to take people by surprise; Ronan relishes the memory of the first time he’d met Adam’s college friends. Of course, Gansey is a little different. They have to live together until further notice (read: until Greenmantle dies, or summer ends, because Ronan isn’t that patient).

 

“How did you and Adam meet?” Gansey tries again, ever polite.

 

Ronan says with a deadpan voice, “He rescued me from a fire-breathing dragon and then we fucked off happily into the sunset.”

 

Gansey, unexpectedly, smiles. “How romantic.”

 

Ronan doesn’t reply, just to make Gansey squirm some more.

 

It’s a long, long car ride.

  


The Hondayota pulls into Fox Way just past eight in the evening. Ronan explains, “This is not where you’re staying, but I have to pick up my kid. You can come inside.” It is not a suggestion.

 

Ronan takes a moment to appreciate the shock on Gansey’s face as he processes Ronan having a child. He would be excited to see Gansey’s reaction to Opal, but he’s still wary of him. He’s clearly not malicious if Greenmantle is out to kill him, but the urge to take Adam and Opal and run far, far away is a strong one.

 

He throws the door open and says loudly, “Keeping your door unlocked is a safety hazard, dumbasses.” Opal’s hooves clack-clack-clack on the laminate floors and she practically leaps into Ronan’s arms; he grins. “Anyone could break in and steal my child.”

 

Blue shouts from the kitchen, “You’ve already taken care of that, ass.” She meanders to the doorway, holding a cup of yogurt. She raises her eyebrows at Gansey, whose eyes are glued  to Opal’s furry legs.

 

“Don’t swear in front of the kid.” He puts Opal down when she starts chewing on the leather bands on his wrists; he’d like them to survive the night without being shredded to bits.

 

There’s half a second of awkward silence before Gansey sticks his hand out at Blue. “It’s nice to meet you. I’m Gansey.”

 

She seems rather unimpressed with him and shakes his hand like he’s just handed her a used Kleenex, which Ronan finds hilarious. They both look at him funny when he laughs, but it’s okay because Opal glares at them and they have the grace to look a little guilty. Or, Gansey does, Blue just rolls her eyes and sighs fondly.

 

Gansey can’t seem to stop staring at Blue, which is strange, because doesn’t he have a boyfriend? But also funny, because _Blue_ doesn’t know Gansey has a boyfriend. “Do you have something to say?” She says icily, holding her yogurt cup in a way that can only be described as menacing.

 

Gansey freezes. “No, I was just. Um.” He pauses, and mutters, mostly to himself, “Dear God, I don’t know how to get myself out of this.” Which is exactly the wrong thing to say to a pissed off maggot, but Gansey doesn’t know that.

 

“I’m truly sorry you don’t have enough common sense to come up with an apology,” Blue growls as she waves her yogurt cup angrily. “Have you ever spoken to a woman in your life? Good night, Ronan, Opal. See you tomorrow.” She spares Gansey one more disdainful glare and blusters, “It was not nice to meet you.”

 

Gansey turns to Ronan with a face white as snow. Ronan just grins. Opal pulls on her rubber boots and they get back into the Hondayota in silence. Once they start driving, though, Gansey’s face falls into something wretched. It makes sense; he’s had a harrowing forty eight hours, but Ronan isn’t about to become his agony aunt.

 

Once they arrive at the Barns, Ronan helps him bring his belongings inside before showing him the room he’ll be staying in, which is Declan’s. This makes Ronan happy, because he’s glad for any chance to inconvenience Declan. He makes Opal take a bath because she smells like an animal and puts her to bed. It all feels startlingly normal, despite the blatant abnormality of the whole situation. It’s odd.

 

He leaves most of his things in their various boxes, which strikes Ronan as strange. He nods toward the pile of boxes and says, “You planning on moving back out tomorrow?”

 

Gansey shakes his head. “No, I just thought I would be staying with Adam once he comes back, so it would be better not to unpack?”

 

Ronan cocks an eyebrow. “Adam lives here. We live together.”

 

Gansey’s eyes widen. “Oh! I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware.” Ronan moves to help him finish with his boxes, but Gansey waves him away. He then seems to _realize_ he’s just waved Ronan off, because he immediately says, “Sorry! I don’t mean to be rude. You don’t have to help me, you’ve already done so much.”

 

Ronan shrugs and leaves without another word. He knows Gansey just wants some time alone, and he’s perfectly happy to leave him alone for as long as he wants.

 

He considers calling Adam, but decides against it. It’s been a long day. He lies in bed, and wonders how much faster he’d fall asleep if Adam was home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Comment, kudos, etc.... I'd love to hear what you think! Also, I promise the next chapters start to get longer and more plotty. 
> 
> Up next:
> 
>  
> 
> _Ronan freezes._
> 
>  
> 
> _Another reason he’s been avoiding Richard Campbell Gansey III is that he hasn’t exactly explained anything to him. Not about his dream magic, or Cabeswater, or why the Barns is filled with impossible things._


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey folks. This is one of the last chapters of the whole fic that's under 4.5-5kish.

Surprisingly, Ronan only hates Gansey a little bit. He’s irritatingly, unfailingly polite and lets Opal chew on his clothes, but he also keeps Ronan company when the nights grow too long and doesn’t question it when Ronan refuses to explain things in the house that shouldn’t technically exist (which may be out of fear, but _semantics_ ).

 

Of course, it all goes to shit on the fourth day of Gansey’s stay at the Barns.

 

Though Ronan tolerates Gansey well enough, he has been trying to stay out of his way as much as possible. He’s not quite used to someone other than Adam, Opal, or Matthew existing in his space. It’s not hard to avoid Gansey; he has work to do on the farm, he has Opal to take care of, he has Adam to call. He hasn’t talked to Blue much in the past few days because of his newfound work ethic, which is why Ronan really should have been expecting the surprise visit. She waltzes into the house one morning while Gansey pads around the kitchen like he owns the place and Ronan shucks off his muddy boots at the back door.

 

“Ronan Lynch,” she calls out in a singsong voice, “why have you been ignoring me?” Ronan makes a point to stomp toward the stairs.

 

“Good morning to you too, maggot, I’m doing terrible, thanks for asking,” he drawls as he trudges up the stairs. “I’m having a shower, have fun with Dick Three.”

 

She lets out a frustrated huff. “Come on, snake.” When she receives no response, she starts banging around noisily, shouting, “Lynch! Ronan! Ronan Parrish! You can’t ignore me forever. Even the Greywaren can’t get out of the duties of friendship!”

 

Ronan freezes.

 

Another reason he’s been avoiding Richard Campbell Gansey III is that he hasn’t exactly explained anything to him. Not about his dream magic, or Cabeswater, or why the Barns is filled with impossible things.

 

The thing is, he doesn’t want to involve another person in… whatever it is Ronan, Adam, and occasionally Blue have with Cabeswater. Together, they went through hell for the ley line, for Cabeswater and Ronan’s dreams. Adam struggled with magically-induced hallucinations for months, and they still haven’t entirely disappeared. Ronan has fought magical dream monsters time and time again. His father died because of the Greywaren powers, and Ronan has come close to it too many times for comfort. So forgive him if he doesn’t want to spill all of this to a _collector_ with three names and a nose he loves to stick into other people’s business.

 

For a moment, Ronan prays that Gansey miraculously misheard Blue, but his hope is shattered when Gansey, his normally controlled voice a little shaky, says, “Excuse me?”

 

Ronan sighs and makes his way back downstairs. He glares at Blue and then explains, “I know Blue hates you, but unfortunately we’re friends so she’s here. Forgot to tell you.” He lets Gansey stare at him incredulously before he adds a deadpan, “Whoops.”

 

Gansey frowns. “You know that’s not what I was talking about.”

 

Blue turns to Ronan. “Have you seriously not told him?” She gives him a lethal scowl.

 

“What the fuck do you want me to say, Sargent?” He demands, crossing his arms and glowering with all his might. “The thing that guy threatened to kill you for is me, also I took half the stuff in this house out of my fucking dreams, and by the way I created a magical forest where time doesn’t work that my boyfriend is basically the god of, what do you want for dinner?” Ronan doesn’t want to be here; he feels like he’s going to vibrate out of his skin. He wants to go for a drive and he wants Adam to come home and he wants Gansey and Blue to go away, but he’s stuck here, with Gansey and Blue staring at him like he’s a feral animal caged in a zoo.

 

Blue puts her hands on her hips in a way that is only threatening when she does it. “Think of someone other than yourself for once, asshole. I’m sure you have Gansey walking on eggshells around you for no reason other than your M– Mach–”

 

“Machiavellian?” Gansey suggests.

 

Blue rolls her eyes. “No.” Ronan knows that was, in fact, the word she was looking for. “Get over yourself and consider being nice, for once. I’m sorry you can’t get laid yet or whatever it is you’re mad about, but don’t take it out on us.”

 

Ronan does not lie. Most people think he’s just being rude for the sake of it when he insults them, but he means every word he says. Which is why, when he tells Blue to “Fuck off and leave me the fuck alone, Sargent,” the venom in his voice is perfectly genuine. He leaves without another word.

 

He wants to go for a drive, but the singular car of 300 Fox Way is blocking his way out. He instead traipses into the land behind the house, not caring where his feet will take him. He ends up in the forest. Normally, the forest is a calming presence. It reminds him of Cabeswater. But today, he can’t cheer up. He’s sore about Blue and Gansey and especially about Gansey having to know everything about Cabeswater. He feels sick at the thought of divulging his greatest secrets to some stranger who happened to be held at gunpoint, just because the whole gun thing was about said secrets. Blue can yell at him until she’s blue (ha) in the face, but nothing can convince Ronan he’s wrong. They could be putting themselves in grave danger without even knowing. Damn Adam’s kindness. (Well, no, Ronan loves that about Adam, but it’s not very convenient at present.)

 

He itches to call Adam, but Adam is working, and also Ronan’s phone is inside. Sometimes Ronan wishes he and Adam (and maybe Opal and Matthew) were the only people on Earth. Then he wouldn’t have to deal with other people’s bullshit, or Adam being gone half the year, and he could tend to his cows until he and Adam were old and gray and never have to deal with fucking Sargent or fucking Richard Campbell Gansey III ever again. There’d be no one to hold anyone at gunpoint in their cramped dorm room, or anyone to sacrifice boys for magical forest rituals, or anyone to kill fathers.

 

It would be a simpler world. A happier one. But it wasn’t reality, unfortunately. At some point he’d have to go back and face Blue and Gansey. The thought makes him feel suffocated; he doesn’t want to apologize to them, he doesn’t want to bare his soul to some rich asshole who poked his head into shit he shouldn’t have just because the aforementioned rich asshole happened upon Adam at the right time. Abruptly, Ronan wants to cry, and immediately feels stupid for it. This incident is invisible next to the shit he’s survived, and yet it still feels like the air is being squeezed out of his lungs.

 

He really is a fucking idiot, he thinks. Ronan honestly, truly thought he and Adam could go on the rest of their lives tending to Cabeswater and raising their magical satyr daughter and being happy and in love with no more magic (well, no more than usual), no more murders or sacrifices, no more danger.

 

He’s sitting on the ground, back leaned against a tree when Opal finds him. She takes one look at his tear-stained face and careens into his lap, hooves digging into Ronan uncomfortably. “ _Kerah_ ,” she says plaintively. Ronan wraps his arms around her and buries his face in her neck; she’s more of a comfort to him than she seems to realize. Before she was torn from Ronan’s dreamworld, she was there through all of his dreams and all of his nightmares. She’d pulled him out of the way at the last second before a grotesque dream creature sunk their claws into him more times than Ronan could count. She’d been something of an oasis in the desert back then, and he wants so badly to feel that same kind of security right now.

 

It’s been a long time since Ronan felt this self-destructive, and the loathsome feeling is back and tearing up his stomach with a vengeance. He’s glad Opal turned up when she did, because otherwise, he might have gone and done something stupid like called up Kavinsky or drunk himself into a stupor. Now that he thinks about, those two options aren’t entirely off the table, which is a little scary and a little exhilarating. He clutches Opal tighter.

 

He’s not sure how long they sit together like that. Eventually, Opal wipes the tears off Ronan’s face with her grubby sleeves and prods at him forcefully until he stands up and follows her deeper into the woods. Ronan doesn’t explore the forest too often, but Opal does, clearly. They end up in a clearing. It looks magical; there’s no other way to describe it. The grass is impossibly soft and it’s ringed by a perfect circle of tall, elegant oaks. It’s impossibly quiet, except for the breaking of bark and sticks by Opal, presumably to eat. Ronan doesn’t even have the heart to stop her, not when everything is so peaceful. He could almost fall asleep out here.

 

♕

 

Ronan supposes he did fall asleep, because he drifts awake from a dreamless slumber. It’s nearly pitch dark out, which is… odd, and Opal has disappeared, which is less so. He tries to look out at the trees, but there are none; it’s almost completely black.

 

He can’t see anything in the faint light. He can hear something, though: one sinister sound. It sends a nasty chill down his spine.

 

 _Tck, tck, tck_.

 

It’s been a long, long time since Ronan met one of his nightmare creatures. Not since the summer after he dropped out of Aglionby at the end of his junior year, so Ronan is a little out of practice with fighting Lovecraftian raven monsters. The thing wastes no time chasing him down as soon as it has him in its sights. Ronan scrambles backwards, searching for something or someone to help him, but finds nothing. Opal is too far away to save him today.

 

The night horror thrusts a grisly claw at him, but Ronan ducks out of the way. He tries to shove it back, but it has about as much effect as punching a brick wall. It throws Ronan like a ragdoll into a jagged wall behind them. ( _Cave_ , his mind supplies.) He tries to scrabble away, but it pins him between its misshapen body and the wall. Its beak is dangerously close to Ronan’s eyes. Before his eyes get pecked out or his skin is shredded to pieces, he gives one last attempt at shoving the creature away. With all of his might, he propels himself forward, and it pays off; the monster staggers back. It doesn’t take more than half a second to recover, though. Ronan picks up a sharp, spearhead-shaped stone from the ground, the only weapon available, and ducks beneath the swipe of inky black claws as it comes at him. He aims the stone where the thing’s heart should be (if it even has one), but he might as well be trying to stab it with a stalk of grass.

 

It pushes him to the ground and Ronan braces for impact, but then, something strange happens.

 

Ronan wakes up.

 

Or, someone _else_ wakes him up.

 

For a short second, Ronan is relieved to not have to experience the remainder of that nightmare. Then, reality catches up. Ronan knows all too well what happens when someone wakes him up in the middle of a dream: Ronan isn’t the only thing that’ll return to the land of the living.

 

 _Tck, tck, tck_.

 

He leaps out of the path of the monster to find Blue and Gansey standing, completely frozen, staring at the creature. “ _Do something_ , you useless fucking shitheads. Go, get something from the barn by the house I can kill this thing with.” When Blue fails to move, he shouts, “Fucking move, maggot! Jesus Mary, do you want us all to die?” He gives her a not-so-gentle nudge and she snaps out of her reverie and starts to run. Gansey hesitates for a moment and follows, tearing off after Blue.

 

In the cold light of reality, the beast looks much more frightening. There’s no more finding comfort in the fact that he’ll wake up eventually.

 

As it raises a clawed hand at him, Ronan crashes into it with all his weight. The claws catch his side, but there’s too much adrenaline coursing through his veins for Ronan to notice anything right now. It lurches back before its gaze zeroes back in on Ronan. He’s well aware it couldn’t have been more than a few seconds since Blue and Gansey ran off for something to hold off the nightmare, but he prays they’ll be back soon. He tries to grab at it, to do _something_ while it’s trapped beneath him, but it throws him off. Ronan hits the ground with a sickening _thud_ and drags himself away, but he’s not fast enough. They tussle for what feels like years, but probably isn’t more than a minute or two. Ronan begins to tire and while he’s off his guard, it picks him up like he weighs nothing and holds him up against a tree. Its claws are grazing Ronan’s neck when suddenly, it reels back, causing Ronan to hit the ground, _hard_. Once he recovers from the shock, Blue throws a long knife by his feet.

 

He grabs it and looks up to find Blue wielding a pitchfork and Gansey a shovel. Together, they’re cornering the creature against a tree. Ronan dives into the fray to help them. He comes in from beside Gansey and slashes its throat. It’s extremely effective; the malformed raven pitches to the side, but once it recovers from the blow it throws its arm out, knocking both Ronan and Gansey to the ground like bowling pins. From the way Gansey cries out, Ronan guesses its unnaturally long claws caught him. Blindly, he throws himself over Gansey as he sees the thing looming over them, despite Blue’s best efforts. It swipes at Ronan, who lets out a resounding, “Fuck!” When he feels the skin in his back shred between its talons.

 

Blue, in a surprising show of strength, pushes it off of Ronan and Gansey with her pitchfork, which is now coated in black ichor. Ronan rolls off of Gansey, but the gashes make it harder to do more than that. His head feels light and fuzzy, which is unpleasant but still welcome compared to the searing pain lighting up the rest of his body. It takes him an embarrassing few seconds to remember to open his eyes, to try and fight against his nightmare, but his strength seems to be leaking from his body as quickly as the blood.

 

When he finally manages to pull himself up into a sitting position and take in his surroundings, Ronan sees Gansey’s shovel impaled in the now-barely-moving creature and Blue holding her pitchfork by its neck in case it makes a miraculous recovery. Ronan groans, and Blue immediately drops her pitchfork, which makes Gansey blanch, but Ronan could not give less of a shit right now.

 

“Ronan, how bad is it?” Her hands flit around him, unsure of what to do. There’s flecks of black blood on her face.

 

He grunts. “Fucking hurts.”

 

She frowns. “We have to get you to a hospital. You’re covered in blood.”

 

He shakes his head. “No hospitals. ‘M fine.” If he closes his eyes, the pounding in his head cedes, just a little. He can feel himself drifting off, and it’s a relief.

 

“Wake up, Lynch,” Blue snaps, but concern bleeds through her sharp tone. “I’m driving you to the hospital whether you like it or not. Can you get up?”

 

“Here, let me help,” a new voice pipes up, and oh, right, Gansey’s here. Together, they pull Ronan onto his feet, and _wow_ , he must’ve been hit harder than he thought. He’s overcome by a wave of dizziness so bad he nearly collapses again, but slowly and surely, the three of them make their way to Blue’s car. Once they prop Ronan up in the back seat, he says roughly, “Don’t let Sargent drive, I’ll probably die before we get out of the driveway.”

 

“Hey,” Blue says, but she’s too drained to do anything but concede. She tosses her keys to Gansey and promises to give him directions before shouting, “You better not fall asleep, Lynch.” Or, at least, he thinks he hears her say that; he’s too busy trying to somehow magically stop the sun from shining directly in his eyes and making his head pound. It’s a long ride to the hospital.

 

♕

 

Ronan awakens in a hospital bed. He does not remember how he got here, why his entire body feels like it was put through a garbage disposal, or who it is sitting with Blue in those crappy hospital chairs.

 

“What,” he rasps through the cottony feeling clogging his throat, “the fuck.”

 

Blue stands up. She says something, but Ronan’s more focused on the dark specks littering her face. It takes him a few seconds to make sense of it. Blue doesn’t have freckles. Has she been painting? No, he’s sure he saw her just this morning, when—

 

Oh.

 

“Is it dead?” He croaks out, wincing at how his voice sounds.

 

He thinks he interrupted Blue, because she looks affronted for a moment, before nodding.

 

He asks, fully aware of how wretched he sounds, “Where’s Opal?” He pauses and mutters, “Adam?”

 

“Opal’s with my mom, and Adam’s on his way home now.”

 

Ronan tries to sit up, but it hurts too much. He settles for spitting out a litany of curses, finishing with “That dumbass, he’s almost finished his internship, I’m fucking fine.” Truthfully, Ronan craves Adam presence beside him more than he craves water or oxygen, but that doesn’t mean Adam _should_ end his internship early just because Ronan’s a little banged up.

 

Blue just shakes her head and sighs. “He said he’ll probably get here at nine or ten tonight.”

 

Ronan huffs. “What time is it now?”

 

“Eleven thirty.” Pause. “Ronan, there’s something else…”

 

Ronan just groans and shuts his eyes. He can’t make himself focus on Blue’s words, and he doesn’t want to be in this cold, Adam-less hospital any longer. He doesn’t want to sleep, not after his nightmare-turned-reality earlier, but he’s so tired, and a break from the ceaseless, full-body ache sounds so inviting…

  
  
  


 

Ronan blinks awake. The hazy afternoon light filtering in through the window hurts his eyes. He reaches blindly around for Adam before he remembers the events of the day. He only vaguely recalls driving home from the hospital, which is not a good sign, but Ronan is too tired to care.

 

He tries to sit up, but it feels like his every limb is being weighed down by a ton of bricks, which is actually pretty weird now that he thinks about it. It’s not the first time he’s gotten roughed up, and not even the first time by a demonic dream monster. Taking shit out of his dreams doesn’t physically exhaust him, either. He runs a farm, for fuck’s sake, he’s out moving all goddamn _day_. So why is he so tired? (Unless the hospital had drugged him, but he’s sure Blue would have told him that. Right?)

 

The more he tries to move, the harder it becomes. Eventually, Ronan resigns himself to the fact that he won’t be moving without help anytime soon, which is absolutely mortifying. He wouldn’t mind so much if Adam was here to help him, but, well. It feels like he’s never missed Adam this much.

 

Ronan drifts in and out of sleep for what might be a few hours, but he’s too out of it to be sure. Eventually, Blue and Maura show up in his bedroom, Opal perched on Maura’s hip. Why is Maura here? He raises an eyebrow at Blue menacingly. He knows by now there is something wrong (at least, more than usual), but he doesn’t appreciate anyone in his house he did not personally invite. Especially the women of Fox Way, who Ronan has never felt entirely comfortable around.

 

Maura says with no preamble, “Why do you think you pulled a monster out of your dreams today, when it hasn’t happened in so long?” She’s normally very kind, but there’s a sharp glint in her eyes that Ronan suspects is causing her curtness.

 

He bristles at her words. He knows what creates those nightmare creatures, and he isn’t about to spill it to Blue’s mother. “Fuck off,” is all he says, daring her with a withering glare to further interrogate him.

 

Maura senses she’ll get no answers through this line of questioning and instead asks very softly, “How do you feel, Ronan?”

 

Ronan thinks maybe Maura already knows what creates his nightmare creatures.

 

“Fucking amazing,” Ronan mutters, punctuating his retort with a sleepy blink. He considers asking one of them to help him up, but no matter how much he feels like he’s going stir-crazy in bed, even the thought of moving around is exhausting.

 

“We think you’re sick,” Maura begins gently. “That’s why you feel so tired.”

 

She looks like she wants to talk more, but Ronan interrupts, “I’m not fucking sick, I just got my whole fucking body shredded by a demon, in case you forgot. Jesus.” Sick? That’s the stupidest thing Ronan’s ever heard. He knows something’s up, but he doesn’t have a _cold_. A cold wouldn’t cause this all-encompassing, bone-deep fatigue.

 

Maura takes a deep breath. Blue glares at him. Opal chews on Maura’s shirt.

 

Ronan hopes Maura plans on continuing soon, because he might fall asleep without something to focus on.

 

“Not that kind of sick,” she finally says. There’s regret in her eyes. “We think you’re feeling the effects of… some other kind of sickness.”

 

“Spit it the fuck out, lady, we don’t have all day,” he snaps, glowering, even though Ronan very much does have all day. All this tiptoeing around the subject makes him very, very worried about what’s really wrong.

 

She sighs, and after a long pause, says, “It’s not you who’s sick. It’s Cabeswater.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comment, kudos, etc.! I love hearing from you, comments make my day & motivate me to keep writing!
> 
> Up next:
> 
> _“That was quick,” Calla observes drily. “But you’ve got to break it up. Snake boy, your brother is at the door.”_
> 
> _It is_ not _the brother that Ronan and Adam like.  
> _


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm posting this to avoid studying for exams.

“What the fuck?” Ronan wonders if he’s still dreaming. “Cabeswater can’t get sick. Me and Adam are fixing it. A magic dream forest can’t just catch the flu.” Cabeswater, Ronan’s Cabeswater, cannot get sick. Despite the evidence on the contrary, Ronan refuses to believe it.

 

Maura shakes her head. “Sick isn’t exactly the right word. We can’t really be sure what’s wrong, especially without Adam here, but it seems like it’s been having… power fluctuations. It goes off the charts one moment and then drops to nothing the next.” She pauses and plays with her long hair with the hand that isn’t supporting Opal. “We think it’s possible that you took the creature from Cabeswater when it had almost nothing to give, so it’s taking it out on you, for lack of better phrasing. It’s taking energy from you to fuel your dream magic, because it has none.”

 

Ronan shakes his head. “When something drains the ley line, Cabeswater disappears. Not this.”

 

Maura raises an eyebrow. “When Cabeswater disappeared the first time, nothing happened to me. Today, around the time you pulled the creature from your dreams, apparently, it was like…” she struggled to find the right words. “Someone turned off the psychic radio, so to speak, like someone was blocking our sight. It’s coming back, little by little, but...” She trails off. Blue takes her mother’s hand with concern written all over her face. Ronan looks away.

 

“What time is it?” He demands suddenly.

 

“Just after four,” Blue informs him, looking sympathetic. Ronan knows they’re all aware he’s counting down the minutes until Adam comes home, but he resents the pitiful looks on their faces. Opal stops chewing Maura’s hair so she can jump out of the woman’s arms and climb into bed with Ronan. She smells kind of like wet dog, but he’s too tired to care. He lets himself fall asleep curled around his pseudo child, hoping Blue and Maura will make themselves scarce.

 

It feels like he’s been sleeping for about a hundred years when he feels another body settle into the bed beside him. Opal has since disappeared, and it takes Ronan a moment to realize who it is. Immediately, he grabs at him, pulling them as close as they can possibly be. Adam laughs quietly and presses their lips together. Ronan _hmphs_ , mostly out of anger, because he’s too tired to properly appreciate this. Adam pulls back, taking it as some sort of rejection, but Ronan, because he is sad and pathetic, attaches himself to Adam’s chest so he can’t move away. “I missed you so much,” Ronan murmurs into his boyfriend’s skin. He adds nonsensically, “I want to keep you forever. Harvard can’t have you.”

 

Adam’s lips brush against his throat. “Mmm, I know.”

 

Ronan’s bursting to talk about everything that happened, to ask if Adam’s okay, if anything happened to him, but at this very moment, he’d rather die than break this easy tranquility. He feels seconds away from falling back asleep, but he refuses to let himself waste a moment of Adam’s presence, now that he finally has it. He relishes this; just being close to Adam, touching from head to toe so there’s no telling where one boy ends and the next begins.

 

Before he knows it, though, Ronan is waking up to bright morning light, Adam fast asleep beside him. He still feels exhausted, but getting out of bed is more feasible today. Not that he would, when Adam is finally beside him, but the option is there. Probably.

 

He really, truly wakes up once the pain of yesterday’s wounds returns in full force. His stomach aches with hunger and his mouth tastes horrendous. He really should get up, but Adam’s serene face traps him in bed. God himself could personally descend from the heavens and demand that Ronan move, but he’d just clutch Adam tighter.

 

Unfortunately, the peace is shattered when Blue knocks on their bedroom door and shouts, “You two better be decent in here, I’m coming in.” She waits exactly zero seconds before barging in. Adam blinks groggily, not bothering to sit up, even when Blue plants herself on the bed.

 

“Fuck off,” Ronan grunts into Adam’s chest, but it sounds like gibberish, so Blue ignores him. She asks, a little nervously, “How are you two feeling today? Gansey thinks it’s a good idea to go to Cabeswater.”

 

“Well, if _Gansey_ thinks it’s a good idea,” Ronan sneers venomously as he struggles to pull himself up. Adam helps him after an awkward few seconds. Suddenly, something occurs to Ronan. He looks at Adam suspiciously. “Why wouldn’t _you_ be okay?”

 

Adam’s face melts into something apologetic, which worries Ronan even more. “When I was driving home yesterday, I had to pull over, because I was. Seeing things.” Ronan is suddenly furious at Blue for interrupting their morning, invading their _bedroom_ just because she wanted to. Adam, however, seems to think the anger on Ronan’s face is directed at him, because he says hurriedly, “I was going to tell you when I got home, but you were so tired, I didn’t want to keep you up. They told me what happened.”

 

This only serves to incense Ronan further. Not only had Adam had a hallucination (which happened so rarely anymore that it could not be a coincidence) that Ronan had to learn about through Blue, but everyone else had the chance to talk to Adam before him. It’s a slightly irrational thing to be angry about, but Ronan doesn’t really care. He whispers to Adam, quiet enough that Blue can’t hear, “It’s not you, fuck, I’m just…” he trails off helplessly, but Adam understands anyway. Ronan glares at Blue, which she bares her teeth childishly at, and Adam arches an unimpressed eyebrow at her, which makes her roll her eyes and leave.

 

Ronan wants to punch a wall.

 

He feels so damn helpless. He’s effectively immobile until further notice, and Blue wouldn’t even consider the fact that she wasn’t welcome here until _Adam_ wanted her gone. He’s not a fucking child. As he burrows his face into Adam’s neck, he thinks, _this is not how I wanted our reunion to go_. Adam seems to agree, because he says, “I wish they’d all go away.” Ronan agrees wholeheartedly, and expresses this by kissing and biting at Adam’s neck. After a few minutes of this, Adam gently nudges Ronan away.

 

“We should talk about this,” Adam says sensibly.

 

“You got me all worked up for a talk about feelings?” Ronan snaps, but there’s no bite behind his words.

 

Adam grins. “You are insatiable.”

 

It occurs to Ronan that what Adam just said is a rather Gansey-like thing to say, which is a mood killer, and then whatever was left of said mood is beaten out of him once he realizes he knows Gansey well enough to recognize when someone speaks like him.

 

Ronan ignores all of these unfortunate Gansey-related thoughts and says, “Tell me what happened on the drive here, dumbass.”

 

Any remnants of Adam’s good mood fly out the window. “It was terrible, Ronan.” He pauses, and Ronan can feel the tension building in him. “I was on the road and suddenly I couldn’t see the cars around me. It came in flashes, at first, I had enough time to pull over, but…” He shivers. “It’s never been like that before, Ronan, it was _everywhere_. I couldn’t see any of the real world, I wasn’t even sure what _was_ the real world. It was so dark, I couldn’t see anything more than dying trees and there was this horrible noise, like the whole forest was screaming.” He shudders again, and Ronan wants nothing more than to shield him from all of this, to steal him away from everyone and everything, even Cabeswater.

 

“I’m so fucking sorry, Adam.” The normally meaningless platitude means everything when Ronan says it. “I wish I could have been there, I’ve been fucking terrified something was gonna happen to you all week. If something happened to you…”

 

Adam sighs. “Yesterday morning, Cabeswater went completely silent, and then they called me about you, I didn’t know—” he cuts himself off. His eyes are a little wild with desperation, and Ronan understands how he feels. “I got home and everyone was trying to talk to me about everything that happened, but I just wanted to be with you.” He takes a moment to pause and look at Ronan meaningfully. “Why did you have that nightmare, Ronan?” Concern drips from his unchecked Henrietta drawl.

 

Ronan does not like direct questions about _feelings_. He’d prefer to dance around the issue and be generally annoying. But this is Adam, and Adam knows what gives him those nightmares. Ronan can't hide from him.

 

“Sargent was mad because I didn’t tell Gansey about everything.” He takes a deep breath, steeling himself for what he knows he has to say. “I don’t like the idea of telling other people about Cabeswater, and me. I don’t give a shit if it’s like, important, or whatever. It’s our lives. Fucking Gansey doesn’t deserve to have all of that just because he showed up here.” Ronan’s voice grows infinitesimally smaller. “And I felt like a fucking dumbass, for thinking we could get away with taking care of the ley line forever or whatever. And I missed you. I felt like.” It _hurts_ like he’s physically tearing the words out of his chest. He finally whispers, so quiet it’s nearly inaudible, “I felt like going to see K, or something.” He wants to tack on some kind of reassurance like, _I wouldn’t have actually done it_ , but he’s not entirely sure that’s true.

 

Adam lets out a gusty breath. “ _Ronan_. You should have called me.” His voice is half concern, half irritation. Ronan shrugs. “Oh, Ronan.” Adam presses his face into (what little there is of) Ronan’s hair. “I’m sorry I wasn’t home.”

 

Every time Adam calls the Barns _home_ , Ronan gets a rush of happiness. “It wasn’t your fault, idiot,” he mutters. Just then, his stomach growls. Adam laughs and helps him out of bed. If it were up to Ronan, he’d laze around in bed all day with Adam until he could move on his own to save himself the embarrassment of having to be effectively carried everywhere, but he doesn’t have that luxury.

 

Once they’ve brushed their teeth and put on fresh clothes, they make their way downstairs. Ronan sends death glares at everyone who dares to look at him, which is everyone, but no one actually stops staring. He hisses, mostly out of pain, and at least Maura has the grace to look away, finally. Ronan and Adam join the rather sizable crowd of Blue, Maura, Calla, Persephone, and Mr. Gray at the dinner table, presumably gathered for some kind of meeting on What to Do Next.

 

Adam stands up, most likely to make breakfast, but Ronan grabs his hand in a way that says _if you leave me alone here I will kill you_. Adam raises an eyebrow quizzically but sits back down.

 

Calla begins the impromptu meeting by demanding, “Where’s Gansey?” Ronan bares his teeth at her just because he can. She glares.

 

“On the phone with his parents somewhere,” Maura replies, steadfastly ignoring the silent exchange occurring. “Ronan, how are you feeling?”

 

Ronan shrugs and then winces, which suffices for a reply.

 

“First order of business: can we reverse the effects of whatever happened with the line yesterday?” Blue asks, looking around. Her eyes land on Ronan. He scowls.

 

Calla waves a hand vaguely. “There are rituals for strengthening the line, but something’s sapping its energy. It’s a bandaid solution at best.”

 

Maura interjects, “Besides, even if it unblocks whatever it is that’s stopping us from seeing, I don’t think it’ll help him.” She gestures at Ronan.

 

Blue says, a little eagerly, “We should go to Cabeswater to see what’s wrong with it, since it can’t talk to you anymore.” Maura frowns at her daughter.

 

Persephone, who Ronan had honestly forgotten was at the table, contributes, “It would be unwise to go to Cabeswater until we can see what it needs.”

 

Blue crosses her arms. “It beats sitting around doing nothing.” Ronan agrees they shouldn’t sit on their asses and wait for the solution to come to them, but going to Cabeswater is not a good idea. He knows from experience what Cabeswater can be like when something has upset its balance, and he won’t be the one to exacerbate the problem.

 

Calla rolls her eyes at Blue. “I don’t like this any more than you do, but it’s too dangerous. Be sensible.”

 

This infuriates Blue for reasons Ronan cannot fathom, but he finds it entertaining all the same. He’s happy to relish in Blue’s anger, but Adam asks, “So we’re just going to wait to see if Ronan gets better?” The _what if he doesn’t?_ goes unspoken. If Ronan looks closely, he can see the tension coiled in Adam’s body, the frustration boiling just below the surface. Ronan moves imperceptibly closer.

 

No one at the table dares to invoke the ire of Adam by challenging him, so Maura moves on. “The fact that this happened so soon after Greenmantle found Gansey can’t be a coincidence.”

 

Mr. Gray nods. “I’ve been hearing whispers for a long time that Greenmantle was getting back in the game; it’s possible he’s found the ley line,” he says hesitantly, “but I don’t think that’s very likely, if he was threatening Gansey about it.”

 

“Wait,” Adam says slowly, “why was Greenmantle out of the game in the first place?”

 

Just then, Gansey crosses the threshold into the kitchen/dining room, phone in hand. He frowns at the bleak expressions pervading the group. He sits down gingerly beside Blue, who glares halfheartedly at him.

 

The Gray Man frowns. “His wife, Piper, died. It was shortly after I stopped working for him.”

 

Blue interrupts what she must assume is a pointless line of questioning. “All this means is that we have two threats to the ley line to deal with, at least until we figure out how they’re connected,”

 

Ronan lets out an exasperated sigh. “In summary,” he says, words cold and hard as stone, “we know fuck all and we can’t do shit until Cabeswater calms down.” He itches to sag into Adam’s side, but he’s too irritated to show any sort of emotion in front of so many people, or to give Blue something else to needle him about.

 

Adam sees this and elbows him gently, enough for Ronan to feel it but not enough for it to hurt. Ronan rolls his eyes and entangles their legs beneath the table.

 

“Holy shit,” Blue says suddenly, staring at Ronan and Adam.

 

“Making a big deal out of gay PDA is frowned upon,” Ronan replies primly, just to piss her off.

 

“Shut up. If you two making eyes at each other freaked me out, I’d never want to be in the same room as you.” She sighs with frustration. “Cabeswater loves you two, right?” Adam nods. “So then it must love the fact that you’re, like, together.”

 

Adam and Ronan look at one another. Hesitantly, Adam says, “Not that I’ve noticed.”

 

“...But?”

 

“We’ve done... rituals together, which have more effect than they probably should, if the books are anything to go by.” Adam explains vaguely. Calla smirks at them from across the table. Ronan grins back wolfishly.

 

“What kind of rituals?” Gansey interrupts, eyes gleaming with curiosity. Ronan really doesn’t like academics. (Adam doesn’t count, because he’s actually tolerable.)

 

Adam flushes immediately. Ronan laughs, and when Gansey still looks confused, he explains with a catlike expression, “The sex kind.” He relishes the way Gansey’s face immediately bursts into flames. Adam quickly adds, “Among others,” to relieve the awkwardness, but everyone acts as if he hadn’t spoken.

 

In truth, Adam and Ronan had spent more time working with the ley line than even the women of Fox Way seem to realize. Because Adam Parrish is Adam Parrish, he’d pored over a myriad of ancient texts and bullshit spiritual scams as soon as he’d sacrificed himself to the ley line, just in case there were any gems of truth hidden amongst the nonsense. Ronan vaguely remembers being annoyed by it at the time. He’d argued something like, “Parrish, you can’t turn my magic dreams into science,” or “It’s gonna be creepy as hell to have trees watch us fuck, that’s not my kink,” but he supposes it turned out alright. He’s pretty sure they’re the Cabeswater-equivalent of married at this point.

 

Persephone asks in her small, airy voice, “Is that all? It’s possible you could have botched a ritual and hurt Cabeswater. Or made a promise you failed to keep.”

 

Ronan hisses. The others don’t know shit about the ley line. Okay, that’s not exactly true– they know some shit about the ley line. But Ronan and Adam are the ones who maintain it, who strengthen it and keep it alive. It’s their responsibility, since they were the ones to wake it up. Adam shares this sentiment, apparently, because his voice is tinged with bitterness when he says drily, “I think we know what we’re doing, thanks.” If it had been anyone but Persephone, Adam’s reaction would not have been so merciful.

 

“It was just a question.” Ronan is constantly surprised by Persephone’s inability to sound ingenuine.

 

“Anyway,” Blue says pointedly, “once the ley line calms down and Ronan feels better, we should go try something to at least make it better for now, so _this_ doesn’t happen again.” Ronan does not appreciate her tone when the _this_ she’s referring to is his near-death.

 

“Look,” Ronan says apologetically, “I know you want to help, but you’re not my type.”

 

Blue reddens. (Ha.) “You know that’s not what I meant, you— ugh. You’re so— you’re impossible, Lynch,” she sputters. Her righteous fury is very amusing to Ronan, mostly because it’s packed into a five-foot frame. Blue does _not_ appreciate his laughter at her, but she refrains from rising to the bait.

 

Maura nods. “I suppose it’s the best we can do until we find something more permanent.”

 

The group falls silent, but before anyone can leave, Adam says, “I could try scrying, to see if I can communicate with Cabeswater?”

 

Instantly, Ronan says, “Fuck no.” He hates it when Adam scries, hates that Adam can be so far away from him even if they’re right beside each other. He also hates the fact that there’s always a chance he could dive into the aether and never return, and even more that Adam doesn’t seem to care about that.

 

“It’s important.”

 

Ronan is not going to have this argument in front of the jury, so he just snaps, “No.” If he could, Ronan would stomp off dramatically, but that would only serve to humiliate him now.

 

The others, sensing a spat coming on, slowly disperse until Adam and Ronan are the only two left in the room. Adam gets up and starts moving around the kitchen while he waits for Ronan to work up to what he wants to say.

 

Adam can’t scry. It’s not an option, not when Cabeswater is so out of control. Ronan hates that Adam would willingly detach his soul from his body at _all_ , let alone now, when it’s more dangerous than ever. Nothing is important enough to put Adam in that kind of danger, no matter how carelessly Adam treats his own life. Ronan also hates that someone has to hurt Adam if he can’t pull himself out, and often Ronan is the one Adam chooses to ground him. Ronan will not, under any circumstances, go quietly on this matter, but he knows Adam doesn’t need his approval to act. He doesn’t have the words to _voice_ all these things, though, so while Adam is reading the instructions on the store-bought pancake mix, Ronan says, because he’s an emotionally stunted idiot, “If you scry, you’re sleeping on the couch until you die, motherfucker.”

 

Adam turns to him, raises an eyebrow. “What if you die first?”

 

Ronan snorts. “Then you’ll be so dedicated to upholding my memory that you’ll sleep on the couch anyway because you’re fucking gay.” Adam rolls his eyes fondly. Before he can think about it, Ronan blurts out, “I hate it when you scry. I don’t like it when you’re gone.”

 

Adam puts the pan he’d been holding on the counter. “It would help us. It helps me.” He looks pained; if Ronan were able to stand up on his own, he’d go over there smooth out the crease between Adam’s eyes.

 

“It’s dangerous while Cabeswater’s all fucked up, Adam,” Ronan retorts, bringing his leather-clad wrist to his mouth.

 

Adam shrugs, faux-casual. “Some things are worth the risk.” His eyes lock with Ronan’s. “It kills me to see you so helpless, I know how much you hate this. I can’t just let this happen, if there’s a way to fix it.” Frustration is building in his eyes. If Ronan doesn’t spit out what he’s trying to say soon, he knows the fallout will be disastrous.

 

“It’s not fucking worth it! It’s your _life_ , you can’t just throw it away like it’s nothing, Parrish.” Ronan breathes heavily. He’s either going to scream or cry if Adam doesn’t get what he’s trying to say.

 

“Yeah, it’s _my_ life,” Adam snaps. His hands are gripping the counter so tightly his knuckles whiten. Lines of tension decorate his face.

 

The words bubble out of Ronan before he can stop them. “You would fucking kill yourself over the goddamn ley line? You’d separate your soul from your body just because you can’t _not_ solve a problem?” His voice wavers, but Ronan continues. “You’d just leave— fucking _choose_ to leave me alone like that?”

 

Adam’s eyes light up with frustration. Ronan grins darkly; Adam, though he learned long ago how to put up with Ronan’s bullshit, is as easy to anger as ever. Ronan doesn’t _enjoy_ fighting with Adam by any means, but riling him up like this is perversely satisfactory in a way that is probably not healthy but Ronan will never tire of. “No, asshole, you know that. You’re not getting rid of me that easily.”

 

Ronan matches Adam’s icy glare. “ _I’m_ not getting rid of you. You’re getting rid of you. I know we’re forever but forever means jack shit if you die next week because you’re such a headass.”

 

Adam raises an eyebrow; Ronan wonders how he can pack so much sarcasm into such a miniscule movement. “Forever? Are we getting married?” He asks drily, lips quirked into a smirk.

 

“Don’t change the subject.” Ronan wishes Adam would come over to him so he could get in his face or kiss him or something, but he stands in the kitchen alone, angrily tearing open the box of pancake mix. “I don’t give a shit if Cabeswater fucking dies because you don’t scry.”

 

“That’s the problem, Lynch. If it dies when I could have helped, where does that leave me?” He snaps, an ugly twist to his mouth.

 

“Alive.” Ronan crosses his arms and gives Adam a mighty scowl. Adam, to his delight, abandons the Betty Crocker and crosses the room so he’s leaning on the table by where Ronan’s sitting. He taps his fingers on the table absentmindedly. Ronan is momentarily distracted.

 

“Cabeswater’s in trouble and it needs my help.”

 

Ronan hisses, wild and feral. Adam’s so fucking _stubborn_. “You. Can’t. Fucking. Die. On. Me.”

 

“I’m not going to _die—_ ”

 

“You could. And where would that leave me, asshole? Fucking tell me. I’m telling you I don’t want you to die and you’re _not listening_. Fuck you.”

 

Adam closes his eyes for a second. He then hefts Ronan onto the table so he’s standing between Ronan’s legs which is fucking annoying but also unbelievably hot. “I won’t scry, okay? Now shut the fuck up.”

 

“Don’t tell me to _shut up_ , I’m not being unreasonable here.” And then Ronan kisses Adam, filthy and perfect. Ronan’s hands wrap around Adam’s neck and wind through his hair, pulling him close. Adam pulls back after a few seconds and whispers, “I would, you know.”

 

Ronan, kiss-stupid, frowns. “What?”

 

Adam laughs, but the tips of his ears turn pink. Ronan files this information away for later. “Marry you. I mean, we’re already Cabeswater-married, so—” Ronan cuts him off with another kiss. He kisses Adam like they’re the only two people in the house, in the world world and _oh_ , Ronan thinks he could just die right here when Adam swipes his tongue just so.

 

Unfortunately, their moment is interrupted.

 

“That was quick,” Calla observes drily. “But you’ve got to break it up. Snake boy, your brother is at the door.”

 

♕

 

It is _not_ the brother that Ronan and Adam like.

 

Calla leads Declan into the kitchen, because Ronan refuses to show Declan his weakness. Adam stays close at his boyfriend’s side; Declan’s surprise visits never end well. Once Calla leaves, it’s just the three of them. Declan raises an eyebrow at Ronan and gestures at Adam minutely, which Adam takes to mean something like _Does he really have to be here?_ Ronan makes a rude gesture in return, which Adam translates as _Fuck you, asshole_.

 

“Ronan,” Declan greets his brother. “Parrish.”

 

They both say nothing.

 

Adam does not like Declan Lynch for a great many reasons. Most of them are _he doesn’t like Ronan_ or _he causes Ronan pain_ or some variation of _Declan Is A Threat To Ronan’s Happiness_. These are not the only reasons, though. Whenever he sees Ronan and Adam being in any way affectionate, he raises an eyebrow or curls his lip disdainfully, like right now. Adam also can’t help but suspect that Declan thinks Ronan should have chosen someone of a higher status, someone with more money or connections or clout.

 

Declan looks up at the ceiling and sighs before announcing, “I’ve heard rumours that there’s someone very dangerous out there looking for the Greywaren. I thought I’d come and warn you before you get yourself killed, but I guess you can’t be bothered to care.”

 

Ronan barks out a harsh laugh. “We fucking know. You’re a little late.”

 

Declan doesn’t allow the shock to show on his face, if there is any. “What are you going to do about it?” The brothers exchange a series of indecipherable looks even Adam, who is completely attuned to Ronan’s every move, can’t parse.

 

Finally, Ronan spits out, “I’m not leaving the Barns. I can deal with this on my own.”

 

Declan closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. “It would be safer for you to come to DC. You wouldn’t have to stay with me, just not _here_.”

 

Ronan sneers. “What, you gonna pay some fucking babysitter to watch me so you don’t have to deal with me? Keep me under wraps so I don’t cause any problems for your career?” Declan winces at the reference to their mother, but Ronan bulldozes through it. “Keep me locked up in the cupboard under the stairs? We’re not fucking leaving.” Declan frowns at the pronoun. Adam places a placating hand on the small of Ronan’s back, which deflates his fury, if only a little.

 

Declan remains calm, but his voice is as sharp as a knife and dripping with poison. “You’re too reckless. You can’t run forever. I know this is difficult for you to get through your skull, but you have to assume some kind of responsibility sooner or later. And don’t fucking talk about mom.”

 

Ronan tenses against him. Ronan and Declan’s mother, Aurora Lynch, had gone catatonic after the death of her husband. Declan dealt with it by sending her to some private home and aying the nurses to keep quiet about her odd condition, which was truly the fault of her status as a dreamthing rather than any illness.  Adam knows if Ronan had the energy, he’d be up in Declan’s face. “I said I can fucking deal with it on my own, shitstain. Get out of my fucking house. Sorry I’m not as convenient as mom to kidnap.”

 

Declan’s nostrils flare, the only sign of the immense frustration he must be feeling. “I have worked very hard to keep what the Greywaren truly is a secret. You will not go and ruin that because you can’t think about this rationally.”

 

This is perhaps the only positive thing about Declan, the part of him that Adam grudgingly respects. He looks out for Ronan, even though Ronan doesn’t care. Declan loves Ronan, in his strange, Declan way.

 

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Ronan hisses. “I’m not gonna let you order me around just because you think you know better.”

 

“I _do_ know better,” Declan shouts, stepping closer. “I’m doing this for your own good. Just fucking listen, for once in your life.”

 

“You don’t know anything about what’s going on here, don’t try to pretend you do,” Ronan snarls, leaning forward. Adam wishes he could see what Ronan was thinking. This kind of fight is far from uncommon, and while Declan is far from Adam’s favourite person, it’s not fun to witness the ugly quarrel.

 

“So why don’t you tell me?” Declan’s voice has returned to an appropriate volume.

 

“Get the fuck out of here.” Ronan’s statement is punctuated by an icy glare. When Declan doesn’t move, Ronan roars, “Get _out_!”

 

When Declan continues to stare Ronan down, Adam steps forward, raising an eyebrow as if to say, _you’re really going to do this?_

 

Declan’s eyes narrow to slits. “I’d appreciate it if your guard dog could let us have a civil conversation.” His words are careful, measured; he know exactly what kind of effect this will have. Ronan grabs Adam’s arm to pull himself up off where he’d been sitting on the table. He makes a valiant effort to hide his infirmity as he approaches his brother, but it shows. Declan’s obnoxious glare becomes a frown at Ronan’s limp, but he doesn’t comment. Adam’s every instinct is telling him to go help Ronan, but he knows how it would look.

 

Ronan leans in, slow and menacing, until he and Declan are just inches apart. “If you ever talk about him like that again,” he growls, “I swear to fucking God you’ll regret it. Get. The fuck. Out.”

 

Declan rolls his eyes and sighs like Ronan is a child throwing a tantrum. “Don’t think you’re getting out of explaining whatever the hell’s going on with you,” he snaps, but he turns and leaves. As soon as Declan is out of sight, Adam rushes to Ronan to catch him before he can collapse from exhaustion, which looks awfully likely. Ronan throws himself on Adam and nearly crushes him beneath his dead weight. “Darling,” Ronan moans, “take me to my fainting couch, I’ve come down with a case of the vapours.”

 

Adam snorts. “Fuck off, you ass.” He then proceeds to lift Ronan into his arms, despite numerous protests, and carry him into the living room, where the congregation has once again assembled. Ronan doesn’t even pretend to fight Adam’s grip in front of everyone, though Adam thinks it might have more to do with the drooping of Ronan’s eyelids than a newfound disregard for his carefully-curated prickly persona.

 

They settle in the corner of a two-person couch beside Blue, whose slight stature barely takes up enough space for one person anyway. Ronan throws his feet into her lap, and though she sticks her tongue out at him, her face softens at Ronan’s state of exhaustion.

 

“You should let him rest,” Maura says, pointedly eyeing the bandages visible through Ronan’s tank top. “He needs it.”

 

Ronan opens one eye and remarks, “I wasn’t aware my house acquired a fucking peanut gallery while I was sleeping.”

 

Maura takes a calming breath; Adam knows she’s gathering the dregs of her patience. “I just want to help.”

 

Ronan props himself up on the armrest of the couch. Adam snakes an arm around his waist, as much to hold Ronan up as to initiate another point of contact. “You can all leave now. In fact, I encourage it, Jesus. We can’t do shit right now. Get out.”

 

No one moves.

 

Ronan tenses, but before he can work himself into a outburst, Adam rolls his eyes and says, “We’ll be fine.”

 

“You’ll drive yourselves stir crazy if you stay here,” Gansey chimes in, glancing empathetically at Ronan’s half-asleep figure.

 

Blue, making an executive decision for her kin, stands up and announces, “ _You’re_ going to drive _them_ stir crazy, take a hint, mom.” Adam is immensely grateful. Blue ushers her family away, only after Calla demanding, “If anything happens, we better be the first ones to hear,” and Persephone murmuring something about “listen to the trees, Adam.”

 

Ronan is dead asleep in Adam’s lap by the time the last of the Fox Way clan is out the door, and it doesn’t take Adam long to nod off, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comment, kudos, etc! I changed my tumblr so now I'm at beetlejeuse.tumblr.com
> 
> Up next:  
>  _Before Gansey can leave, though, Adam hears himself say in a voice that is not quite his own, “_ LISTEN TO US _.” His vision abruptly goes black._


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey y'all! i'm finally done school woohoo!!

Adam and Ronan are curled together on a porch swing on the veranda around back of the house, drinking in the lazy Virginia heat. The sun creeps slowly toward the horizon, staining the sky infinite hues of pink and orange. The idyllic landscape of the Barns is breathtaking at this time of day. Adam missed this while he was away more than he could say, and now that he’s back, it’ll be harder than ever to leave; his heart twinges just thinking about it. Ronan, having slept through the morning and most of the afternoon, is wide awake and against all odds, content to sit in companionable silence. Opal had a bath and is finally gone to bed, so Adam and Ronan finally have the night to themselves.

 

The thought springs, unbidden, from the recesses of Adam’s mind: how long will this peace last? The majority of Adam’s senior year of high school was spent surviving Cabeswater’s vivid, terrifying hallucinations; he’d been convinced he wouldn’t live to graduation. Now, Cabeswater was more dangerous and unpredictable than ever, and considering what he experienced on the drive home to Singer’s Falls, Adam suspects it’s going to be a long, harrowing summer. This is only the beginning. 

 

Ronan pinches Adam in the arm. “I can hear you thinking, Parrish.”

 

“I’m not thinking,” Adam lies, smacking Ronan’s hand away.

 

Ronan lets out a single derisive laugh. “Your brain never turns off, liar.”

 

Adam sighs. “It’s nice out here. With you.” He hesitates. Talking to Ronan is the most natural thing in the world, and yet somehow completely impossible at the same time. “But it feels temporary.”

 

They can’t see each other’s faces, but Adam knows, like he knows water is wet and the sun rises in the east, that Ronan’s expression sours instantly. “You have something you wanna say to me, babe?” His voice begs for a fight. Adam doesn’t take the bait.

 

“That’s not it, asshole. We’re forever, remember?” He fumbles around for Ronan’s hand, thanking any higher power who might be listening that Ronan takes it instead of rebuffing him. “I put all this crap behind me. I never wanted it to come back like this.”

 

Ronan laughs hollowly, sarcastic and scornful and full of dread all at once. “Don’t I fucking know it.” His weary, battered body is tense against Adam’s side. Adam turns to look at Ronan, and he can see the words building up on his tongue, threatening to overflow, but Ronan says nothing. 

 

“I can hear you thinking, Lynch,” Adam mocks, punctuating it with a kiss on the corner his boyfriend’s mouth. “Didn’t know you could think at all, actually.” Ronan growls and turns his head that last half-inch to capture Adam’s lips in a searing kiss.

 

Ronan murmurs against Adam’s lips, “Don’t be an asshole, asshole.”

 

Adam, just to be an asshole, bites down on Ronan’s bottom lip, and Ronan whines, which is positively enticing. Adam wants nothing more than to recreate that reaction, when—

 

A voice says, “Um.”

 

Ronan tears himself away from Adam. “You gotta stop sneaking up on people, you’re gonna get yourself fucking killed, man.” 

 

Gansey replies, “I may be killed anyway, apparently.”

 

Adam, not entirely present enough to maintain his accent, drawls through kiss-swollen lips, “Is there something you need?”

 

“I was hoping for an explanation, but you’re obviously, um. Clearly preoccupied.” Gansey’s words come out in fragments as he blushes like a particularly conservative Southern grandmother who’s just walked in on— well, Adam and Ronan making out. 

 

Adam gestures toward one of the wicker chairs, silently inviting him to take a seat, which he does. Gansey takes a deep breath, taking a moment to look out at the picturesque land and painted sky spread out before them. Finally, he says firmly, almost practiced, “What is Cabeswater? And how are you two connected to it? Blue and Maura briefed me on the basics of the situation, but I’m still rather lost.”

 

“It’s a forest on the corpse road,” Adam begins, reluctance bleeding through his every word. Each syllable feels like he’s giving away the shattered shards of his soul. “Ronan— did anyone tell you what the Greywaren powers are?” Gansey nods. “Ronan dreamt Cabeswater up. It’s a physical manifestation of the ley line, basically.” The next part is harder. “I’m Cabeswater’s conduit, sort of. It talks to me.” That’s as much as Adam’s willing to divulge.

 

“How did you become the conduit?” Gansey demands, eyes bright with badly-concealed excitement. The fevered scholar who carefully pieced together that journal is coming through, and Adam decides he doesn’t like it one bit, not when he’s the subject Gansey is studying. “Were you born with these powers, Ronan? How—?”

 

“That’s as much as you’re getting, Dick,” Ronan snaps, rubbing his thumb over Adam’s hand in an effort to calm him. 

 

Gansey frowns. “I’m sorry if I’ve overstepped,” he says, genuinely apologetic. “I know I can be a little much.” He smiles self-deprecatingly. It’s not that Gansey’s overstepped; in fact, he probably should know about what’s going on, if he’s going to be any help at all. Adam just hates the idea of actually telling him. It’s not Gansey’s business. He wasn’t _there_. Gansey has not earned the right to know why Adam sacrificed himself to the ley line, the wants and needs and dreams he thought it would fulfill one day. He has not earned the right to know about Ronan’s terrible, wonderful dreams and his father, the dreamer, and his mother and younger brother, the dreams. Adam, though he knows it’s irrational, kind of hates him for dredging up their past.

 

After a few moments of silence, Gansey continues quietly, “It’s clear you have a lot of past with Cabeswater that you don’t want to tell me, but I need to know eventually so I can be of help to you.”

 

Ronan’s lips curl into a snarl. “No one asked you to help. You’re here because you couldn’t mind your fucking business about shit you don’t know anything about.” Adam is continually impressed by Ronan’s ability to take the lowest blow possible in any sort of situation. He doesn’t reprimand his boyfriend’s statement because he doesn’t entirely disagree, in spite of Ronan’s crude method of communicating it.

 

Gansey’s reaction is no more than a slight furrowing of his eyebrows. Adam thinks he acts kind of like a robot: he breezes through life with a smile permanently plastered to his face, no matter what’s brewing below the surface. After a few long moments of deliberation, Gansey says in the tone a politician might give a rousing speech, “I’m sorry for interrupting you. I hope we can resolve this later; I wouldn’t like to be at odds with the people who’ve been kind enough to take me in.”

 

Before Gansey can leave, though, Adam hears himself say in a voice that is not quite his own, “ _LISTEN TO US_.” His vision abruptly goes black.

 

Once his eyes have adjusted to the darkness, it occurs to him that it’s not entirely dark. There are light spots, which he quickly realizes are spots of light filtering through trees. It’s another vision from Cabeswater, but this one is immediately and infinitely more terrifying. The trees are dying, just like the last time; the normally lush foliage is dry and empty. The leafless, gnarled trees curl into the air like claws tearing through the sky. Even more unsettling is the sludge spilling from the galls speckled on the trees. In his deaf ear, Adam hears the same ear-piercing shrieking as before. He clutches his hands over his ears, and from a world away Adam feels Ronan wrap his arms around him.

 

Adam, or perhaps someone else borrowing his voice, says, “ _WE ARE RUNNING OUT OF TIME._ ” A buffeting gale picks up in the forest. The trees creak ominously and the wind howls furiously, so loud that Adam can barely hear himself say over the cacophony of noise, “ _MAGICIAN, WE HAVE MISSED YOU_.” For one long, torturous second, the chaos crescendos; the air screams and the trees screech and whip against one another under the buffeting winds. The sickening black sludge bursts from the trees, so hard and fast that Adam thinks he’ll drown.

 

Abruptly, it stops. 

 

Adam opens his eyes, only to close them when the light of day hits him. Ronan rubs his back comfortingly. Adam’s not sure how long they sit like that while he waits for his head to stop spinning so he can finally open his eyes. It’s only because he hears Ronan whispering “Breathe, Adam,” that he realizes his breath is coming in short, heavy pants.

 

It takes give or take a thousand years for Adam to feel okay enough to look up. When he does, Gansey sighs a breath of relief. Ronan pulls Adam into his side, and Adam is too drained to do anything but melt into him. 

 

“Is that normal?” Gansey asks, though he looks like he already knows the answer. 

 

Adam shakes his head. “Not the talking.”

 

Gansey’s eyebrows climb his forehead at an alarming speed. “What else happened?”

 

“A vision.” he shudders. “I don’t want to talk about it.” He levels Gansey with a look that insinuates just how unwilling he is to talk to him. Unexpectedly, Gansey rolls his eyes, which makes Ronan laugh, which gives Adam a headache. It’s going to be a long night.

 

♕

 

Ronan is rifling through the kitchen cupboards in search of a clean mug, but it’s not looking good. He seriously considers making Adam’s tea in his own coffee mug from earlier that day, arguing with himself that they share spit enough already; this is nothing. Finally, he finds a mug hidden behind the plates. It’s rainbow and says in a tacky font, ‘NOBODY KNOWS I’M GAY’. He’d probably hidden it away because it had been a gag gift from Blue, and he wouldn’t be caught dead actually using it where she might see, but now that he’s found it again, he realizes it would be hilarious to flaunt it at Declan. 

 

Ronan can hear Gansey video calling his boyfriend, Henry, in the dining room. Gansey talks quite a bit about Henry, and every word makes him more and more unwilling to ever meet him. The kettle _ding_ s, and while he fishes around for the peppermint tea (Adam’s favourite), he hears raucous laughter from the dining room. Gross.

 

Once the tea is done, Ronan walks behind Gansey to make his way upstairs, because Adam is lying in bed with a searing headache from his psychic visions and Ronan is a good boyfriend. However, the voice on the other side of the Skype connection says incredulously, “ _Ronan Lynch_?”

  
Ronan narrows his eyes. There had been many, many Henrys at Aglionby; old, posh names were inevitable when your school was populated by trust fund babies. However, this particular Henry had been singularly irritating. 

 

“Cheng.”

 

Gansey gawps. “How do you know each other?”

 

“We went to Aglionby together!” Cheng cries gleefully. “Oh, Ganseyboy, you should have told me his last name. I love the mug, Lynch, didn’t know you swung that way.” He winks. “Maybe I would have payed more attention to you, back then.”

 

Ronan raises an unimpressed eyebrow. “It’s not for me,” he says slowly, taking a sip from the rainbow mug. Adam won’t mind. “This is for my boyfriend.” 

 

Cheng guffaws. “Who’s your—” he cuts himself off and grins wider. “Adam Parrish! You sly dog. Give me the juicy details, Lynch, when did this happen? Can we get in on it?”

 

Gansey looks positively mortified. Ronan replies, “For the right price.” Impossibly, Gansey reddens even more. 

 

Cheng laughs good-naturedly. “You haven’t changed one bit. Tell Parrish I say hi.”

 

Ronan snorts. “Tell your mom thanks for the good time last night.” He storms off without another word. Out of all the goddamn Henrys in the world, Gansey had to pick that one? Cheng left Aglionby after sophomore year to move out to DC, but Ronan remembers him. Cheng made himself impossible to forget with his trivial campaigns and inane politics. (Maybe not completely inane. Ronan vaguely remembers some anti-homophobia and transphobia thing, which Ronan, then repressed and depressed, watched fall apart with glee. It would have been nice during Adam’s senior year, but there’s no use thinking about that.)

 

Upstairs, Adam is lying down looking very awake, but the expression on his face says he wishes he wasn’t. Ronan places the mug on the bedside table and crawls into bed beside him. He whispers, “You’ll never fucking guess who Gansey’s boyfriend is.”

 

Adam burrows into Ronan’s side. “Hmph?” He says, voice muffled by Ronan’s collarbone.

 

“Henry Cheng.”

 

Adam lifts his head up, eyes wide as saucers. “No.”

 

Ronan nods. “Annoying as always.” He nudges Adam. “Drink your tea, asshole, I slaved over that.”

 

Adam rolls his eyes, but pulls himself into a sitting position. He honest-to-goodness giggles at the mug, but winces. Ronan wishes he could take Adam’s pain away, but Cabeswater’s (and therefore Ronan and Adam’s) afflictions are thus far impossible to cure. Ronan’s aching exhaustion has yet to dissipate. If he has to deal with this fatigue, he thinks he should at least get a good night’s sleep, but he knows already that his insomnia will keep him up to the early hours of the morning. 

 

 Adam says quietly so as not to inflame his headache, “It feels like Cabeswater is trying to reach out to me, but I can’t understand because there’s so much.” He pauses to rub one of this temples, face locked in a grimace. “It’s like this horrible white noise all the time.”

 

Ronan rolls his eyes and scoffs, “Cabeswater can back the fuck off.” 

 

“I think it’s a little too late for that, jerk,” Adam replies drily. He sips his tea and idly traces his fingers along Ronan’s skin. After a few minutes of comfortable silence, Adam slides back into bed and wraps Ronan up in his arms. It’s obscenely cozy; Ronan almost lets his eyes drift shut when he sees a greenish glow shining from over his shoulder. He twists his head around. 

 

Adam’s eyes gleam brightly back at him. 

 

“What?” Adam asks, oblivious to the light shining from his eyes.

 

“Parrish,” Ronan replies slowly, “your eyes are glowing.” Hasn’t fucking Cabeswater done enough for today? 

 

Adam’s mouth opens, then closes again. He struggles for a few seconds before finally demanding, “What?”

 

Ronan sighs and rolls over so they’re facing each other. “Your eyes. They’re fucking glowing green, man.”

 

Adam’s tired face droops even further. “What do we do about it?”

 

“I dunno. Go to sleep, maybe,” Ronan replies lazily. “It’s kinda sexy though, so maybe not.”

 

Adam smacks him. “Shut up, dumbass. Do we call Blue?”

 

Ronan wants more than anything to not call Blue. He has had enough of half of the town of Henrietta hanging around his home, thank you very much. “I would rather do anything that isn’t that,” he replies. 

 

Adam snorts, but Ronan can see the gears turning in his mind. “Maura said that Cabeswater was having power fluctuations, right? It’s probably bouncing back from what happened yesterday.” He drinks from his mug. “We don’t know what’s causing it and I can’t understand what it’s trying to tell me.” He raises an eyebrow at Ronan expectantly. Ronan knows what this means. There are three ways for Adam to communicate with Cabeswater when Cabeswater can’t talk to him: through his tarot cards, by scrying, or going directly to the forest.

 

“So do a reading,” Ronan replies.

 

Adam shakes his head, but the action makes him wince. “I can’t focus enough for that when my head’s like this.”

 

Ronan really, really doesn’t want to call Fox Way, but if Adam’s eyes are literally glowing, the psychics are probably going crazy right now. Which means sooner or later, they’ll have to reconvene about what’s happening. 

 

Sometimes, Ronan wishes it was like it used to be, before Adam met Blue. They’d been friends since they started at Aglionby. Adam was Ronan’s only friend through all of high school. They hadn’t been very close as freshmen or during the clusterfuck that had been sophomore year, when Ronan tried to kill himself. (Declan and Matthew think it was a wound taken from his dreams, and Ronan never corrected them. Adam is the only one who knows about Ronan’s dreaming and still knows the truth.) Though it was only at the beginning of eleventh grade they became close, Ronan had fallen for Adam not long after they met. He hadn’t been able to admit that to himself until the summer after junior year, though.

 

The second half of junior year had been spent gallivanting around Henrietta. It makes Ronan smile to think about: they were the kings of Nowhere, Virginia, and the front seats of the BMW were their thrones. It was one one of these drives that they happened upon Cabeswater. It had been Adam’s idea to go explore this unknown forest, despite the fact that not five minutes before, he’d been complaining that, “this is private property, asshole, do you want to get arrested?” Ronan remembers Adam checking the time on his shitty watch and panicking about missing his shift at the factory, and then finally finding his way back to the BMW only to find that not ten minutes had passed, even though they had to have been walking around for hours. 

 

It was that summer that Adam sacrificed himself to the ley line. Ronan remembers it crystalline clear: he’d been sleeping, for once, when Adam appeared in his dreamscape. This was not a new or even uncommon occurrence, but this Adam looked much too real to be dreamt up. Despite it being daytime, Cabeswater was very, very dark. Ronan called out to Adam, but he appeared not to hear. Normal. 

 

Then, Adam stumbled across that _woman_.

 

It was when he spotted the knife in her hand that Ronan realized it was not a normal dream. 

 

He sat bolt upright in bed and didn’t hesitate before driving to Cabeswater as fast as the BMW would allow. 

 

He’d found Adam there with a knife at his throat, in the middle of some fucking occult circle with that Neeve lady. He threw her off of him, but then everything went to shit, and Adam had to go and sacrifice himself to the goddamn forest anyway. (At least Neeve fucked off into her mirrors and never came back out.)

 

Ronan still can’t think about Adam’s sacrifice without being reminded of the catastrophe that came after. 

 

He’d been very, very angry at Adam for that. He’d been angry at everyone, at everything, and Adam going off to the stupid fucking magic dream forest on his own and sacrificing his body to the aforementioned forest had been the tipping point. Even before that, their friendship was solid but full of sharp edges and pitfalls. The fights had been frequent and intense.

 

So Ronan did something very stupid.

 

He stopped hanging around Adam and started hanging around Kavinsky and his pack. He learned how to control his dreams. His bad habits worsened. Ronan flirted with death. Kavinsky flirted with Ronan. It all came to a head at the end of the summer, when Ronan crashed his BMW when a dream creature came at him out of nowhere. Kavinsky, who he’d been racing, helped him kill it. 

 

Ronan did not want to owe Kavinsky for saving his life. He realized he didn’t want anything to do with Kavinsky anymore; Kavinsky’s drugs and cars and attention might have been enough for him when he was freshly struck by the wound of his father’s death, but not anymore. So Ronan took his car to Boyd’s and began down the long, winding road to becoming a real live person again. 

 

The end of that summer was when Ronan finally kissed Adam. Mostly, he wanted to do it before either of them got themselves killed. Adam’s Cabeswater hallucinations were beginning, and he was knee-deep in research on what the fuck Cabeswater even _was_.

 

That was when they met Blue, and with Blue comes her insufferable family. 

 

“What’re you frowning about?” Adam asks, placing his mug back on the nightstand. His glowing eyes droop with tiredness.

 

Ronan tucks himself under Adam’s arm. “Nothing.”

 

“Is it Blue?”

 

Ronan Lynch does not lie, but he really, really wants to. He says nothing. He expects some lecture about how he should be nicer and how much help her and her family have been, but all Adam says is, “I know.” This is not the response Ronan expected, but he can see, clear as day, in Adam’s glowing eyes that Adam has resigned himself to involving everyone else in this problem. Tomorrow will be another day of worrying and planning and trying to stay awake instead of spending the summer with Adam and Opal, fixing the happy, healthy, _normal_ Cabeswater. 

 

Abruptly, there sounds a knock at the door. It isn’t Opal’s erratic, impatient knock, which leaves just one possibility.

 

“Come in,” Ronan says, not too loudly. It’s partly for Adam and his headache, partly so Gansey won’t hear him and leave. Unfortunately, Gansey pushes the door open, holding Ronan’s ringing phone in his hand. Ronan scowls, though he’s not sure how effective it is while he’s basically putty under Adam’s arm. 

 

“Blue has been calling you for,” he grimaces, “a while. I thought it rude to answer your phone, but I think it’s important, especially now considering…” he trails off and looks at Adam significantly. 

 

It amuses Ronan that Gansey’s had to listen to his ringtone, the murder squash song, for who knows how long, but Adam’s wincing at the sound sobers him. Regretfully, he removes himself from Adam’s side and sticks his hand out for the phone. Gansey hands it to him and stands awkwardly by the edge of the bed. “Sit down, Jesus,” Ronan snaps.

 

“Actually, it’s Gansey,” Gansey replies coolly.

 

“Fuck off.” He answers his phone. “What.” 

 

“Thank God. Asshole. Is anything happening over there? Mom and everyone are saying that they can see again, but that it’s all too loud, which means Cabeswater is bouncing back,” Blue says all in one breath.

 

“Chill the fuck out, Sargent,” Ronan says coolly. “Nothing much happening. Adam had a vision earlier. Cabeswater talked through him. Now his eyes are glowing. The usual Friday night.”

 

“Not funny, Lynch,” Blue says, unimpressed, but when Ronan fails to reply, she gasps. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

 

Because Ronan doesn’t enjoy updating the maggot on every single thing that happens to them. Because this could have waited. Because he doesn’t fucking _want to_.

 

“Didn’t have my phone,” is all he says, in a tone that communicates to Blue that yes, he is rolling his eyes at her right now.

 

“You’re insufferable,” she huffs. 

 

“Love you too, babe,” Ronan says in a cartoonishly cheerful voice. Adam elbows him.

 

“Can you come here? Persephone is very worried about Adam, and we should figure out why this is happening.”

 

Ronan can’t help it. He laughs. He only feels slightly bad because it makes Adam flinch. “Fuck no.”

 

“Just listen to me—”

 

“Fuck. No. Do you want to come get Opal out of bed and drag her into the car? Do you want to use some fucking magic bullshit to wake me up enough to be able to drive there? Because Adam can’t drive because he’s got a headache bigger than you, which is exactly why he shouldn’t be stuffed into your godawful house. Go fuck yourself.” And then he hangs up.

 

“Asshole,” Adam snaps. “I think that’s the longest thing you’ve ever said to her.”

 

“Fuck you too, then,” Ronan hisses, glaring. Before Adam can truly get angry, though, Ronan crawls back into his arms. Gansey shifts uncomfortably.

 

“You can either join us or get the fuck out,” Adam says, voice carefully neutral as if he expects Gansey to actually consider both options. Ronan snickers.

 

“Actually, I was hoping to talk to you guys about something,” Gansey says nervously, not daring to look either of them in the eyes.

 

“Get on with it,” Ronan says, raising an unamused eyebrow when Gansey takes too long to reply.

 

Gansey braces himself before saying, “Henry wants to come see me.”

 

Ronan immediately snarls. “That asshole can stay out of my fucking house.”

 

Adam sighs defeatedly, which Ronan knows means that Henry will be coming here. That doesn’t mean, though, that Ronan is going to go down without a fight. “What does he know about all of this?” Adam asks reluctantly.

 

“I haven’t told him anything about Cabeswater,” Gansey replies apprehensively. Ronan is glad that Gansey is the only one in the room who doesn’t know the outcome of this situation; he doesn’t seem to be the kind of person who’s used to not knowing things. 

 

“I don’t want to involve anyone else in this shit,” Ronan argues. “It’s a bad idea.” If he was thinking about this logically, he’d realize that if he was in Henry’s position, he’d walk across the fucking country to get to Adam. However, Ronan is not thinking logically. 

 

Adam’s eyes roll. “I fucking know, Lynch. But would _you_ want to be trapped in a house with _us_ all day?”

 

“Sounds like heaven,” Ronan snarks. 

 

“You’re giving me a headache, Lynch,” Adam says, in that way of his where you barely realize he’s made a joke until you’re doubled over laughing. Ronan grants him a small, secret smile and mutters, “Fuck off, moron.”

 

And that’s that.

 

“Thank you so much,” Gansey says once he translates their argument into something he can understand. “It won’t be for long, I swear. I hate to do this to you.”

 

“He can’t fly here,” Adam says brusquely. “Greenmantle probably has eyes everywhere.”

 

“I’ll tell him,” Gansey promises, and then scurries out of the room before Ronan’s glare can make him dissolve into a puddle. 

 

“Fucking Cheng,” Ronan hisses from where his face is pressed into Adam’s collarbone.

 

“Fucking Cheng,” Adam agrees, blinking his emerald-glowing eyes drowsily. “Night, sugar,” he murmurs, Henrietta drawl dripping like honey. 

 

“Sweet dreams, dickwad.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Catch me at beetlejeuse.tumblr.com. Comment, kudos, etc!
> 
> Up next:
> 
> _A tree towers over them, the tallest tree for as far as Gansey can see. Its branches are bare and it looks dead, a sharp contrast to the lush green foliage surrounding them. A howling wind picks up. Adam steps back into Ronan’s arms, visibly shaken. Gansey’s gaze travels up the old, dying tree and land on what Adam’s eyes appear to be trained on: a knot of plant gall. From its centre spills a sludgy black ooze. It has the appearance of oil, but the consistency of molasses; Gansey feels sick looking at it._


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey y'all, my wrist hurts from typing so much so I have to take a break from writing and it's killing me.

Adam drives himself and the other three occupants of the Barns to Fox Way in the morning. His eyes have mostly stopped glowing and his headache has made itself scarce. In the back seat, Opal is crouched over Gansey’s hand, which is placed between them. She inspects his watch with narrowed eyes, comparing it to the old dollar-store watch given to her by Adam, now covered in bite marks and no longer functioning. Adam carefully does not think about how much the watch on Gansey’s wrist costs. 

 

They arrive at Fox Way to find it in simultaneous quietude and chaos. Maura, Calla, and Persephone are gathered in the kitchen, locked in some kind of silent but intense exchange. The kitchen looks like it was abandoned in the middle of the making of a pie, which is how Adam realizes just how off-kilter Persephone is. Blue is sulking on the couch, staring at the coffee table, which is covered in five different tarot decks and several empty yogurt cups. He can hear either Orla or Jimi stomping around upstairs. 

 

Adam hitches Opal onto his hip and pulls Ronan close to him. He feels like he’s entered a fragile ecosystem he could disturb with one wrong move. “Hello, Adam,” Persephone calls from the kitchen, not turning to look at him.  


“Hey,” Adam replies cautiously. After a few seconds of silence, Maura, Calla, and Persephone straighten up in unsettling unison.

 

“We’ve been waiting for you two,” Calla says dangerously.

 

Ronan scoffs. “Too fucking bad, princess.” Opal, a friend and great admirer of Calla, smacks him in the side. Ronan winces. Adam knows there’s a wound from the dream creature just where Opal hit him, but now does not seem to be the right time to scold her.

 

Blue, finally distracted from her yogurt wasteland, joins her mother and the other two women. Her choppy hair sticks out in unfortunate places that seem to indicate she’s been running her hands through it repeatedly. Adam knows the feeling. “About time,” she hisses in a voice that is appropriate for how one might feel after a night of being the only non-seer in the house while the psychic radio tuned back in at an impossible volume. 

 

Maura’s face contorts into a frown that is half-caring, half-irritation. “Adam, you’re so loud.”

 

He shrugs. 

 

“Sit down,” Persephone says in her tiny voice. “You’re taking up space.” She says _space_ in such a way that Adam’s not entirely sure what kind of space she means.

 

They squash together in the living room. The scene is reminiscent of the previous morning, save for a few minor details like Adam’s luminescent eyes and the magical sort of feeling in the air (maybe Adam’s the only one who notices that second one, now that he thinks about it). 

 

“So,” Blue begins, “vision. Cabeswater talking. What did it say?”

 

Ronan says in an eerily accurate impression of Adam while Cabeswater was possessing him, “ _SQUASH ONE SQUASH TWO_ — _”_

 

“It asked me to listen to it, and said we were running out of time,” Adam interrupts before someone can kill Ronan, “and that it missed me.”

 

“Running out of time for what, exactly?” Maura asks no one. “We have to talk to Cabeswater, and soon.”

 

“I can do a reading,” Adam offers, “I brought my cards. But that’s as good as it gets unless we actually go to Cabeswater.” He doesn’t miss how Gansey’s eyes brighten with interest, nor does he like it.

 

Calla shakes her head. “It’s impossible while it’s so loud in here.” She glances at Ronan before adding, “You could try scrying.”

 

At the same time, Adam and Ronan say, “No.” Calla rolls her eyes. 

 

“So what do we do?” Blue asks, eyes shining in a way that indicates she knows exactly what they’ll decide on doing. “If the only option left is going to Cabeswater…” She trails off meaningfully.

 

Maura shakes her head. “It’s too dangerous. Especially with you there.” 

 

“We can’t go to Cabeswater until it’s fixed, we can’t fix Cabeswater until we find out what’s wrong with it,” Adam says. “We should just go.” He’s been so concerned with his fucked up visions and Ronan’s safety that he hasn’t had time to worry about Cabeswater itself. If he tunes in to the constant hum at the back of his mind, it’s obvious the forest is in pain. 

 

Maura and Calla glare at him, while Persephone stares through him with an expression something akin to concern. He supposes it’s a little hypocritical; he’ll listen to Ronan when he tells him not to scry, but not to anyone else when they tell him not to go to the magical forest having a temper tantrum. However, Adam doesn’t care. Calla’s painted fingernails tap on her armrest menacingly as she snaps, “What was the point of coming here if you were just going to decide to go directly against what we’re telling you is best?”

 

Adam knows all too well that Ronan does not get along well with Calla, which is why he’s prepared when Ronan explodes. “Didn’t realize you guys were the fucking experts on my magic dream forest,” Ronan snarls, eyes narrowed and body tense like a wild animal ready to strike. “Wait, none of you have even been there, and the only person who can talk to the fucking forest is telling you we should go.” The _so shut the fuck up_ goes unspoken, but is heard all the same. Adam feels weirdly proud. 

 

Calla’s eyes roll, and she shares a Look with a capital L with Maura and Persephone. It probably means something like _ugh, teenagers_ , or _ugh, snake_ , but Adam doesn’t care enough to decipher it. It irks him a little, that the women of Fox Way treat Adam, Ronan, and Blue like children, though he supposes he understand why. Still, it irritates him; though he sometimes feels impossibly young, Adam has not been a child for a long time. He’d grown up before any teenager should have to, and it paid off; now, he’s sitting with his kid in his lap, freshly home from his first year at Harvard. Adam is not naive, and resents being treated as such. Instead of saying anything, he looks at Ronan. They share a Look with a capital L, and it means something like _fuck them_ , or _I can’t stand this anymore_. 

 

Blue breaks the silence. “When do we leave?” Adam watches as she finds her mother staring at her with frustration. Blue holds her gaze unflinchingly. His heart does something strange. When no one replies, she says, “Might as well go now.”

 

Calla, Maura, and Persephone all raise their eyebrows at them in perfect unison. Adam mirrors the gesture, unimpressed. 

 

He’s a lot better at standing up to adults these days.

 

Adam, Ronan, Gansey, and Blue crowd into Ronan’s BMW, and it’s only then that it hits Adam they’re bringing Gansey to Cabeswater. Adam and Ronan, kings of Cabeswater and keepers of its secrets, are bringing a stranger (Acquaintance? Friend?) who could pose all sorts of dangers into their domain. The prospect is a little terrifying, and more surprisingly, a little exciting. Adam’s not sure how he feels about that, so he files it away to think about later. Ronan glances over at him from where he’s seated in the driver’s seat and gives him a half-smile, half-glare, which is Ronan’s way of saying _I know exactly what you’re overthinking about and shut the fuck up about it_. Adam listens. 

 

♕

 

Gansey thought they were going straight to Cabeswater, but instead, Ronan parks the BMW at the Barns. Before anyone can get out, though, Adam says, “Stay here, I’m just getting an umbrella.” 

 

No one seems to think this odd, so Gansey knows he’ll get a look from Ronan when he asks the question, but he’s dying to know. “Why would we need an umbrella? It’s beautiful outside.”

 

As expected, Ronan’s expression in the rearview mirror twists into something mocking. Gansey’s used to it by now. Blue rolls her eyes at Ronan and explains, “Cabeswater doesn’t work like it does out here. We could go through all four seasons in twenty minutes. And if something’s wrong with it…”

 

Gansey could keep interrogating them about this strange forest until he goes hoarse, but he refrains. Every ounce of his being wants more than anything to _know_ , but the feeling of severe intrusion is greater than his desire for knowledge. He can’t help but feel _other_ when he’s alone with Ronan and Adam; there’s just something about them. It’s more than third wheeling, more than the way they revolve around one another like binary stars. There’s something supernatural about them, like they’re royalty from some far off kingdom, untouchable and otherworldly. They are, in a way. Gansey remembers the day of the dream creature’s attack, the day Ronan finally told him (if briefly and pugnaciously) what was going on. He mentioned how Adam was basically the god of Cabeswater. Gansey has yet to see any of Adam’s godliness in action, but he will soon, and Christ, is he excited. He’s heard plenty of accounts of strange occurrences on ley lines, but never someone who could _speak_ to one. Once Adam rejoins them in the car, umbrella and a pile of sweaters in hand, Gansey can barely contain his anticipation.

 

“Aw, shucks, Parrish,” Ronan says. “You worried about us?”

 

Adam whacks him with the umbrella. “Drive, Lynch.”

 

They park outside of an innocuous forest. Ronan grabs the umbrella, swinging it around like a baton, and Adam ties his sweater around his waist. Ronan snorts at him, and Adam snaps, “When we get stuck in a blizzard, you won’t be laughing, asshole.”

 

Ronan’s hand circles around his waist. “I’ve got my love to keep me warm, Parrish.” He manages to make it sound like a threat.

 

Cabeswater doesn’t seem out of the ordinary. It’s only after they’ve been walking for a half hour that their surroundings begin to change. Dark, rain-heavy clouds amble lazily through the sky, threatening to spill at any moment. Gansey pulls on his sweater.

 

Occasionally, Adam will stop to move around some rocks or unblock a stream for reasons unknown. Ronan stands close at his side the whole time. Well, closer than usual. They seem completely in their element here. If Adam and Ronan are kings of a far-off kingdom, it’s Cabeswater they rule. Ronan meanders through the forest as if he’s spent his whole life here. Gansey, on the other hand, wishes he could spend his whole life here. The brooks are filled with tropical-looking fish that change colour when Gansey blinks and the trees hang heavy with foreign fruit. It’s the most wonderful thing he’s ever seen. Though his surroundings are completely impossible, Gansey feels like he belongs here. It’s a strange feeling. Gansey is not the sort of person who often feels out of place, but the rest of the world pales in comparison to the utter _rightness_ of Cabeswater. 

 

After another fifteen minutes of walking, the rain clouds empty their contents. The four of them duck under the umbrella, but it’s not much help; they’re all soaked to the bone within a few minutes. 

 

“You enjoying Cabeswater, Dick?” Ronan asks, looking up at the sky. 

 

Gansey grins. “Tremendously.”

 

Blue shivers, hugging her arms in a fruitless attempt to warm up. “What are we looking for, Adam?” 

 

“I don’t know, something wrong.”

 

“Is anything _right_ here?”

 

Adam stops. Since they’re all sheltering from the rain beneath the same umbrella, Gansey and the others bump into him. “Look,” he says, breath no more than a whisper. 

 

A tree towers over them, the tallest tree for as far as Gansey can see. Its branches are bare and it looks dead, a sharp contrast to the lush green foliage surrounding them. A howling wind picks up. Adam steps back into Ronan’s arms, visibly shaken. Gansey’s gaze travels up the old, dying tree and land on what Adam’s eyes appear to be trained on: a knot of plant gall. From its centre spills a sludgy black ooze. It has the appearance of oil, but the consistency of molasses; Gansey feels sick looking at it.

 

“What’s wrong?” Adam shouts, running his hands through his dripping hair. His voice cracks. “What do you need me to do? I want to help. I can’t understand you.” When he receives no answer, he steps out into the storm. “What the fuck do you _want_?”

 

Abruptly, the wind dies down. The torrential downpour slows to a light rain and the sun disappears behind the dark gray clouds. Gansey notices the flowers spattered across the ground are all inexplicably facing Adam.

 

“ _MAGICIAN, WE HAVE MISSED YOU_ ,” a hundred voices say at once, or maybe just one. 

 

“I know,” Adam cries. “I’m here.” His voice is filled to the brim with a kind of desperation that hurts Gansey’s head to hear.

 

“ _THE RAVEN KING IS HERE_ ,” the forest screams and whispers. “ _WE NEED YOUR HELP._ ” There’s a pause, and the whole forest seems to hold its breath. “ _THE ANSWERS YOU SEEK LIE BEYOND YOUR REACH, BUT BEHIND OURS_.”

 

The sky clears.

 

“What,” Ronan hisses, “the fuck?”

 

Adam turns back to them. The sun, now peeking out from behind the clouds, forms a halo around his head. “It’s dying.” Ronan and Adam share a look, one so raw Gansey feels like an intruder just seeing it. Adam turns away from them and approaches the drunk of the dead tree. Plants spring up from around his feet, wrapping around the trunk as if trying to heal it, but the green stalks wither and curl upon contact.

 

“Is that all?” Adam’s voice shakes almost imperceptibly. When he adds, “I’m trying to help you,” Gansey suddenly understands what Ronan meant when he called Adam the god of this forest. It sounds like he’s speaking from everywhere at once; it’s mesmerizing. He wishes he’d caught it on video.

 

The forest stays silent. Adam comes back to them, face dark. The rain resumes once again, but the halo of light around Adam’s head remains. “I came all the way out here so I could listen, and it doesn’t even have anything to say. Who’s the Raven King?”

 

Ronan scoffs. “What did you expect?”

 

Blue shakes her head, though at what Gansey is unclear. “Maybe it can’t talk to us,” she suggests. “Maybe it ran out of energy after going off last night.”

 

“Maura said it was still loud when we left,” Gansey points out.

 

Blue shrugs, and glares a little at him. “Time doesn’t work like that in here.” 

 

“It’s still loud,” Adam cuts in. “It’s like I can feel it in the air.”

 

“Feel _what_?”

 

Adam gesticulates vaguely. “The magic. Whatever’s in that tree, and whatever’s coming.” He seems to be increasingly distressed, which is worrying because something going disastrously wrong in this particular forest while Gansey and the others are in it would not be pleasant. Ronan, thankfully, senses Adam’s state of unease and attaches himself to his side, whispering something into his ear. 

 

“What do you think of Cabeswater?” Blue asks. Gansey is relieved to not be the only spectator of the show that is Adam-and-Ronan. He is also relieved that Blue is speaking to him in a manner that isn’t hostile, which is certainly an improvement from all the other times she’s spoken to him, really.

 

“It’s positively magnificent.” He can’t help the stupid grin overcoming his face. “I’ve never seen anything like this!” He points at a bush a few feet away, ripe with berries that don’t exist. “Look at that, Blue, this shouldn’t be possible. But there it is. I never want to leave. The weather has room for improvement, though.” And just like that, the rain stops.

 

“Wait,” Blue says, staring at the suddenly cloudless sky. “What?”

 

“It’s normal,” Adam tries to assure Gansey. The doubt in his voice is too great for the platitude to mean anything, though. “Cabeswater responds to what you think. But…” he trails off, staring at the trees around him.

 

“It doesn’t feel normal,” Blue finishes for him. In moments like this, Gansey feels frustrated. He’s only known Blue, Ronan, and Adam for a few days at most, but he feels like he’s found something with them, though he can’t put a name to it. It feels big and unavoidable and important, like the four of them were meant to meet. He’s sure they feel it too, what with the way Blue always falls into step with him, figuratively and literally, when it’s she could be around anyone else, and how Adam and Ronan always make him feel welcome and safe, despite their apparent annoyance with his presence around their home. The frustrating thing is not that he doesn’t know what “normal” Cabeswater feels like; it’s that he feels like he _does_ , and he doesn’t know why. 

 

“ _RAVEN KING, YOU ARE AN OLD FRIEND,_ ” Cabeswater says. “ _WE NEED YOUR HELP_.”

 

Gansey realizes with complete certainty that he is the Raven King, and it makes sense, like a puzzle piece finding its place. “We don’t know how to help you,” he calls into the trees. “Can you please tell us what’s wrong?”  
  
No response.

 

“So Gansey’s the fucking Raven King, okay, let’s go home before it tells us Sargent’s the next pope,” Ronan snaps. Well, he doesn’t quite snap, but everything that comes out of Ronan’s mouth sounds angry to Gansey. Snapping is just his natural way of speaking.

 

Gansey does not want to leave Cabeswater. In fact, he wants nothing more than to stay, perhaps set up camp and live out the rest of his days observing it. Blue seems to agree, but Gansey thinks he knows the real reason they’re leaving. His theory is confirmed when Ronan leans in close to Adam’s side, murmuring something in his ear that does nothing to deflate the mounting tension in Adam’s shoulders. 

 

The trek back to the car takes infinitely longer than the walk from it had, though Gansey supposes that that’s normal. He checks the time on his phone, but it hasn’t changed from the hour it was when they left the car. It rains off and on, but never does it become the downpour it had been before. Gansey is half hoping the forest will speak again, but it never comes. He tries not to be disappointed.

 

Eventually, they come upon a part of the forest Gansey recognizes from before. The trees are particularly dense here, so much so that Gansey worries he’ll lose the others if he doesn’t pay attention. On top of that, the weather has changed; it’s disgustingly hot. Ronan says that the sticky humidity is good, because he “wouldn’t let you ruin my car with your wet ass clothes, be grateful you’re drying, asshats”. 

 

Though Gansey would like to have a drive home, he can’t say he’s grateful for the sudden change in temperature. His chinos were not made with ventilation in mind, and the heat is making him a little lightheaded. So lightheaded, in fact, that it’s only after it happens that Gansey realizes he’s tripped and fallen over a root. His head thuds against a tree dully upon impact, which is not a good sign. Blue helps him up, which makes Gansey smile because she’d been the one to help him before anyone else, but he soon realizes it’s mostly because both Adam and Ronan are unable. Ronan’s exhaustion has caught up with him, and it shows; his feet drag with every step and he’s practically being carried by Adam. Adam, on the other hand, looks wide awake and taut with tension. Even from behind, he looks like he’ll explode at the slightest touch. 

 

Gansey takes in the sorry sight of the four of them, Gansey and Ronan barely standing with Blue and Adam struggling to hold them up, and thinks that it should probably ruin the magic of their expedition. It doesn’t. Despite his dizziness and heat exhaustion, Gansey still feels lit up by what he’d seen. It almost hurts when they emerge from the woods. The banality of the BMW and dirt road hits him like something physical. Everything they found today feels like everything he’s been missing for years.

 

At the Barns, Ronan, unsurprisingly, goes to sleep as soon as they arrive. Adam, even less surprisingly, immediately follows. Gansey is left alone with Blue, which excites him in a way he carefully doesn’t think about.

 

“When’s the boyfriend coming?” Blue asks out of the blue (Gansey has to stifle a laugh at this). He wonders why Adam and Ronan were talking to Blue about Henry’s impending arrival, but he doesn’t have to think too long to form a conclusion; his hosts’ dislike for their former classmate has been made apparent.

 

“He’s leaving tomorrow morning.” Gansey finds he doesn’t really care what Adam and Ronan think, at least not yet. He’s too immeasurably excited for his boyfriend to arrive. He’d been expecting to spend the first month of summer with him; they were supposed to go on a road trip. Though only seeing him through Skype is not something that’s new to Gansey, it doesn’t make it any less painful. 

 

“Exciting,” is all Blue says before disappearing into the kitchen, leaving Gansey alone. He feels relieved in the sort of way you do after a car drives past you on the sidewalk just a little closely, happy to be alive but still reeling from the way the car came so close you were hit with a gust of air. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm at beetlejeuse.tumblr.com. 
> 
> This little preview tells you nothing in the way of plot, but I can't find a section that's not spoilery, so, here's a tiny excerpt of the next monster of a chapter: 
> 
>  
> 
> _Blue says, “What’s up? You called for a reason.”_
> 
>  
> 
> _“I thought you weren’t psychic,” Gansey says lamely._
> 
>  
> 
> _“I’m also not stupid.”_
> 
>  
> 
> _“Ronan and Adam are fighting,” he admits. “I think.”_
> 
>  
> 
> _“I’ll say a few words at your funeral,” she promises gravely._


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is one of my favourite chapters of the whole fic!

After yesterday’s venture, Ronan is less than willing to return to Cabeswater anytime soon. He’s still worn out from the walk, and Adam is no less tense than he had been at Cabeswater. Currently, it’s nearing ten a.m. and they’re watching Opal build some sort of contraption made of leaves and sticks with great concentration. Occasionally, Ronan has to stop her from eating the sticks. All in all, it’s a normal day at the Barns. Well, almost. Gansey is seated in the armchair with his nose buried in a book, which is not normal, but it’s slowly getting there.

 

Ronan is surprised how much Gansey fits in here. Though he is generally annoyed by Gansey’s odd habits, he’s weirdly easy to talk to, if you tune out the academic jargon. On top of that, he seems to have garnered Adam’s stamp of approval, which is priceless in Ronan’s eyes.

 

Ronan is not, however, excited for Cheng to come. Though he’s gotten used to Gansey, he’s even less willing to introduce someone else to the magic of Henrietta, much less Henry Cheng. Cheng reminds Ronan of Aglionby, of who he was when he went to Aglionby. He supposes if Gansey had to pick anyone from that goddamn school, Cheng wasn’t a bad choice. Though, Ronan doesn’t know how he’d feel if Cheng had been there during Adam’s senior year, when their school republicans’ sons had found out Adam and Ronan were dating. It hadn’t been pretty.

 

Once Opal gets bored of her stick apparatus, she disappears into the forest behind the house. Ronan wonders if he’s a bad parent to let her off on her own. He has no way of knowing, really; parenting books don’t really give you instructions for having a strangely independent goat child taken from a dream world. He looks at her sculpture that is some vague approximation of a raven, and thinks he’s doing a pretty okay job for a nineteen year old father.

 

Eventually, Ronan gets bored of sitting around. He stands up from the couch that’s trapped him all day to go out to the barns. At some point he has to start to catch up on all the duties he’s abandoned in his… well, not quite illness, but Adam stops him before he can get anywhere.

 

“I’ve got a fucking farm to run,” Ronan says, all bark and no bite. He places a sarcastic hand on his hip and stifles a wince when his hand grazes a wound. “I don’t know if you’ve heard of this thing called work, Parrish, but I’ve got shit to do.”

 

Adam raises an eyebrow and prods him lightly in the side, not hard enough to cause any real pain, but enough that Ronan feels it. Adam then grabs his wrist, half an apology for poking him and half a plea for him to sit back down. He wants to ignore Adam, to tell him to fuck off, because he really does have to get back. He considers the full-body ache that has yet to disappear, and the bandages holding him together. He considers the warm couch and Adam’s warm body waiting for him. He considers the fact that Adam will be well and truly angry with him if he goes. He considers his exhaustion that’s still, even days later, pulling his eyelids down without his permission. 

  
Then, he considers Henry Cheng coming to live in his home for God knows how long. He considers Gansey, blissfully unaware of the situation occurring before him. He considers his enchanted, live animals, and his father’s enchanted, sleeping ones. He considers his satyr daughter and his dream raven and his perfect, idyllic life with his perfect, idyllic boyfriend that has been turned upside down by shit he can’t control.

 

He pulls his arm out of Adam’s grip and goes outside. 

 

He knows full well he is worrying Adam. He’s worrying himself, honestly; the last time he’d ran off on his own, he’d gone and gotten attacked by a dream monster of his own creation. But honestly, he doesn’t really care; he’s angry at Cabeswater for being cryptic and for hurting Adam, even if it hadn’t meant to. He’s angry at a lot of things, actually. The anger is a welcome feeling. Frustration, disappointment, worry, and fear; they’re all sharp-edged and dangerous. Anger, however, is as familiar to Ronan as the back of his (or Adam’s) hand. It’s a weapon he’s spent years sharpening. Though his phone is inside, thrown inside a drawer in his bedroom, he can feel Kavinsky’s contact name programmed in it like a physical presence, drawing him back inside. 

 

Since he started dating Adam, he’s only seen Kavinsky a few times. He’s not keen on seeing him again, not really, but these churning, broiling feelings of fury directed at nothing at all are what led him to K in the first place, and he wonders if they’ll ever stop dragging Ronan back to him. He doubts it in the same way he doubts he’ll ever be good enough in Declan’s eyes, and the way he doubts he’ll live past thirty.

 

He’s not sure what brought this on. Or, no— he knows exactly what brought it on. He just doesn’t know how he hadn’t noticed it weighing on him so heavily, and he sure as hell doesn’t want to think about it. So he wanders into the forest in search of the clearing Opal brought him to the day he was attacked and hopes Adam doesn’t come out to find him. He shouldn’t, anyway, he’d said earlier that he still felt like shit from Cabeswater. He probably won’t drag himself out of the house just to witness Ronan having a tantrum, and if he does, Ronan will ignore him.

 

The clearing is as beautiful as it had been the first time he’d seen it. One of the towering oaks has a few scratches on it; a grim reminder of what happened here. It’s strange to think of something so terrible happening in a place so picturesque. He wonders who’d done away with the body of the dream thing. Blue, probably, with the help of Gansey or Maura. He wonders when he’ll create another one.

 

He realizes distantly that he’s on a self-destructive path. He’s done enough growing up since high school to recognize that. He knows he should talk to Adam or Blue or anyone at all about this before he does something stupid. Still, this hot, bleeding anger is a welcome anchor as any when everything else seems to be changing. Well, he has Adam, but it’s not like he’s gotten all that much alone time with Adam since his return from school, what with all the disasters and people invading his fucking house. 

 

He sits on the ground and leans back on one of the trees. He won’t fall asleep this time, especially because he doubts anyone will come looking should something befall him anyway. Before he can brood for too long, though, Opal trots into the clearing. She takes a pitying look at Ronan and sits beside him.

 

“Kerah,” she says. Her big eyes bore into Ronan’s soul. When she says _Kerah_ , it means _why are you here?_

 

“Brat,” Ronan replies, and it means, _I don’t know_.

 

She furrows her brows and says, “I think you should stay here.” By _here_ , Opal means what she calls the animal world. Ronan agrees, but doesn’t reply. Sometimes it scares Ronan how well Opal knows him. It’s not unexpected, of course; she lived in his head for the better part of his life. Still, the way her gaze pierces through his rough exterior is unnerving. “I don’t like it,” she adds, which is very vague and confusing, but Ronan has come to expect that.

 

“What don’t you like? Use your words.” He’s not sure he’s in the right headspace for consoling a child, but this child is _his_ child, so consolation it is. Now that he thinks about it, Opal has been outside more than usual, less resistant to the bathtime and bedtime that Ronan enforces every night. (The latter is a welcome change, but still abnormal; he should have picked up on it.)

 

She opens and closes her hands a few times, an odd gesture that Ronan has come to know means she’s stressed out. “Lots of people at home,” is all she says. After a thoughtful pause, she adds, “And I thought no one was allowed to see my legs. But Gansey was allowed to see my legs.”

 

Ronan knows Opal knows why Gansey is allowed to see her legs. He knows he explained the Gansey situation to her on the drive to Fox Way so he could drop her off and go pick up Gansey himself. But maybe Opal feels just as off-kilter as he does with everything that’s going on. Ronan pats his lap, mostly because he’s not willing to try and lift her while his body is still crisscrossed by bandages. She crawls onto him without hesitation, careful not to jostle him too hard. “There’s a lot of shit going on right now, Opal. So things are a little different now. Cabeswater’s sick, and it’s making me and Adam sick too.” He pauses. The next words are harder to force out. “And someone’s looking for me.”

 

Opal frowns. “You’re sad.”

 

Ronan scoffs. “Sure.” He’s not sad. Well, he is; he’s sad and angry and stressed and tired and scared most of all, which he realizes is what Opal is trying to get him to admit. “You’re in danger and Adam’s in danger, and Matthew and fucking Gansey too.” _Because of me_ , he doesn’t say. 

 

Opal presses a wet, sloppy kiss to his cheek. Her hooves dig into his legs uncomfortably and his wounds ache as her full weight presses down on him when she reaches up, but it’s maybe the most comforting thing she could possibly have done. There are a hundred thousand words Ronan could say right now, but words don’t come naturally to him. Instead, he hugs Opal like his life depends on it, and that’s enough for now.

 

♕

 

Gansey is a little terrified for Henry to arrive. He misses him more than words can express, but Adam’s in a mood and apparently doesn’t know where Ronan is. He surmises Adam’s sour disposition is directly correlated to Ronan’s disappearance, but he knows better than to ask. By now, Gansey is acquainted with their matchstick tempers, and while Gansey loves Henry dearly, there’s not a lot of room for his beautiful, _big_ personality in the Barns today. That is, unless Adam and Ronan magically kiss and make up, but it seems unlikely. Despite the way they fall into each other so easily, there has been a tension mounting higher and higher since Ronan’s dream creature attacked. This is a lover’s spat that has been building for days, whether or not the two of them realize it, and Gansey is not eager to involve himself in it.

 

He considers calling Blue. She’d given him the phone number of Fox Way, instructing him to call in case Adam and Ronan ever became “too gross”. He supposes this counts as them being “gross”, but it feels wrong to run off to Blue just because they’re in disagreeable moods. 

 

He calls anyway.

 

Someone named Orla says something about a psychic hotline and something about taking care of him, which makes Gansey vaguely uncomfortable. “Actually,” he says, “I was hoping to speak with Blue, please? It’s Gansey.” 

 

“ _Oh_ ,” Orla says significantly. “Gansey.” She then shouts away from the phone, “BLUE, YOUR BOYFRIEND IS ON THE PHONE!” There’s some more unintelligible yelling and someone stomping toward the phone, and then, “Hello?”

 

“Blue,” Gansey says. “Is that a nickname? It’s very unique.” He likes Blue’s name, but he doesn’t say that. He likes many, many things about Blue.

 

“I will hang up on you,” she threatens venomously. 

 

Gansey frowns. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to insult you. It’s just that I’ve never heard of anyone called Blue before.”

 

“Did you call me to interrogate me about my name, Dick?” Blue asks rudely. Gansey doesn’t mind one bit.

 

“So it isn’t a nickname. That’s wonderful. I like it.”

 

“Are you done?”

 

“I also like Jane. Jane is a nice name.”

 

“I’m about to hang up.” Her voice alone conveys that she utterly serious and willing to do things much worse than hang up the telephone.

 

“I love Blue! Plenty of my favourite things are blue. The sky, for example. However, I do like the name Jane.” 

 

He knows with utmost certainty Blue is going to hang up, but he’s having so much fun. She does, in fact, hang up almost as soon as Gansey’s finished speaking. Within seconds, she calls right back to say, “I’m not answering to— to _Jane_. You can’t just rename me.”

 

“I said nothing about renaming you,” Gansey insists. “I was simply telling you I like the names Blue and Jane.”

 

“I’ll hang up again,” she says, and this time, Gansey’s not so sure she will. They fall silent for a few moments. Gansey’s worried she really did hang up, but then Blue says, “What’s up? You called for a reason.”

 

“I thought you weren’t psychic,” Gansey says lamely.

 

“I’m also not stupid.”

 

“Ronan and Adam are fighting,” he admits. “I think.”

 

“I’ll say a few words at your funeral,” she promises gravely. 

 

Gansey has a weird urge to spill his insides to her, but all he says is, “Orla is certainly a character.”

 

Blue snorts. “That’s one way to put it.” She pauses, and it feels meaningful, somehow. “When’s Henry coming?”

 

“Around one, hopefully.”

 

“I’m happy I won’t be there to see Ronan meet him.”

 

Gansey knows that Adam and Ronan knew Henry from high school. He also gets the distinct impression that Adam and Ronan did not like Henry one bit in high school. Two weeks ago, Gansey would have thought it impossible for anyone to dislike Henry’s vibrant personality, but Adam and Ronan manage to be the exception to the rule. “I am… wary.” Is all Gansey chooses to say on the subject. He secretly hopes Blue will keep bothering him about it, but she doesn’t, and the conversation ends shortly after. After they say their goodbyes, Gansey wonders if she’ll call back immediately like she had before. Then he thinks of Henry. 

 

Guilt is an ugly emotion. 

 

Gansey spends the rest of the morning and early afternoon in his room, or more accurately, Declan Lynch’s room. He has a vague understanding of the Lynch family and their strange, cluttered house (he’s counting Adam as a Lynch, for simplicity’s sake, and it’s also mostly true). Ronan has two brothers: Declan and Matthew. Ronan hates Declan and loves Matthew, and Adam feels the same, though Gansey suspects Adam is a little biased. Declan’s room is bland and gray. It makes Gansey wonder what kind of life he lived here, if there’s so little evidence of him scattered around his childhood bedroom. Opal’s room, which is also Ronan’s room for some reason, is more alive, or as alive as the childhood bedroom of Ronan Lynch could possibly be. Adam and Ronan’s room is the master bedroom, and its walls look too adult to possibly be truly theirs. It makes Gansey wonder about parents, but he perishes the thought. The subject of parents has hitherto been studiously avoided, and Gansey doesn’t make a habit of poking his nose in places it doesn’t belong. Well, not in matters as delicate as these, at least.

 

It’s nearing one thirty in the afternoon when the doorbell rings. Gansey all but runs downstairs to find the door already opened. Adam is awkwardly letting Henry inside, and Ronan watches from afar with Opal hidden behind his legs. Henry looks intensely relieved when he spots Gansey approaching. Gansey wastes no time giving him a peck on the lips, but Adam’s looming presence behind him is too intimidating to try anything further, though Henry’s pout tempts him. 

 

“It’s wonderful to see you again, Parrish,” Henry says. It feels odd to hear someone other than Ronan call Adam _Parrish_. It occurs to Gansey he doesn’t know very much of anything about Ronan and Adam’s lives beyond Cabeswater and the Barns. 

 

“Cheng,” Adam replies tersely. 

 

Gansey sees the exact moment Henry spots Ronan and Opal. He told Henry that Adam and Ronan have a daughter, but he supposes it’s an entirely different thing to see it, considering when they last saw one another. “Lynch!” Henry cries gleefully. Gansey braces for impact.

 

“Cheng,” Ronan greets him in a tone identical to Adam’s. 

 

“Such a warm welcome,” Henry sighs dramatically. “I feel blessed to have such kind hosts.” 

 

Adam and Ronan give him twin unamused stares. Henry doesn’t look the least bit unsettled. Finally, Adam says, “I assume you’re staying with Gansey. He can show you your room.”

 

“I’m terribly excited to continue this high school reunion later, Parrish, don’t think you can get rid of me that easily,” Henry replies breezily. Gansey leads him upstairs anxiously. He’s not eager to get between whatever’s brewing with Adam and Ronan, and it appears Henry’s presence is exacerbating their anger. Hopefully, he won’t be there when they finally explode. 

 

Henry takes one look at the bland walls and twin bed and says, “I suppose this will take some getting used to.” He drops his (numerous and heavy) bags and pulls Gansey in for a real kiss. Gansey would be more than happy to continue this for eternity, maybe, but Henry pulls away. Gansey pouts. “Though I do find you ravishing, I don’t think I’m in the proper mood for that sort of thing after _that_.” The way Henry says _that_ is not insulting, or even particularly negative. It just is.

 

“They’re fighting,” Gansey explains flatly. “I’m not sure why.”

 

“If Ronan Lynch wasn’t fighting, I would think him possessed.” Gansey laughs, but Henry’s expression turns serious. “I have to ask about the girl with the hooves, though.” Gansey wants so, so badly to tell Henry everything, but. 

 

“It’s not my secret to tell,” he admits. “I wish I could tell you, but I don’t really feel like talking to them about it right now.”

 

Henry sighs heavily. “I was so excited to see those two living together in domestic bliss that I didn’t really consider I would have to live with them.” He pulls himself and Gansey onto the bed in one sweeping motion. “I trust you’ll save me from them.”

 

“They’re not so bad.” Gansey thinks of how, before everything went to shit, Ronan made breakfast for three instead of two every morning, and how they kept one another company when the nights grew too long.

 

“Hopefully they’ve cooled down a little since Aglionby.”

 

This piques Gansey’s interest. “Was Adam that bad?” Adam’s just as quick to anger as Ronan, but it’s less overt with him. He doesn’t seem like the type to start fights with his classmates. 

 

 Henry shrugs. “He never fought or anything, like Ronan did. He just about bit the head off of anyone who tried to talk to him though. It makes sense, looking back now, but I really don’t think he even knew he was doing it. He just assumed everyone was making fun of him.”

 

Gansey frowns. “Why would they be making fun of him?”

 

“He was on a scholarship,” Henry explains, but he looks hesitant to reveal anything more than that. Now that he thinks about it, Gansey remembers Adam talking about going back to work a few weeks into summer. It hadn’t struck him as odd at the time, but it makes sense with his worn-out clothing and the careful way he handled his belongings, like he couldn’t bear to have them damaged. Like he couldn’t afford to have them replaced is more accurate, Gansey guesses.

 

“How was the drive?” Gansey asks. He abruptly doesn’t want to talk about Ronan and Adam or about all the things they can’t talk about. Henry starts rambling on about some road rage he encountered with a lime green van, and Gansey settles into his side, perfectly content to bask in this easy sort of peace he hasn’t felt in a while.

 

♕

 

Ronan knows Adam is working up to some kind of outburst, but Adam is also avoiding him enough that Ronan can’t predict when it’ll happen. He knows he could diffuse this situation by just explaining to Adam that everything that had happened during the last few days is kind of freaking him the fuck out, but that he feels better now. Except, some residual frustration is left over from the morning, and he’s already bared his soul to Opal today. He’s going to put off doing that again for as long as possible.

 

He and Opal are playing cards on Ronan’s bed when Adam storms into the room. Opal scampers off immediately, which, if Ronan wasn’t already aware, is a clear indicator that Adam’s ready to blow his top. 

 

“I know you feel like shit right now, but you can’t just go around doing whatever you want,” he starts, settling on the bed. “I don’t like this either, but you’re injured, I don’t know what I’d do if something happened because you’re too much of a stubborn shithead to talk about it.”

 

Ronan rolls his eyes. “You could have followed me, Parrish,” he sneers, just to be a dick. “I wasn’t aware I was locked under fucking house arrest. Do you want me back by curfew, dear?”

 

“You remember what happened last time you ran off on your own, right? And you remember why?” He pauses, just to make Ronan sweat, Ronan’s sure. “I sure as hell do. And if I was there, maybe I could have helped you, or stopped it, but I wasn’t. Today I was there, and you still fucking ran. We’re in this together, Lynch. You’re supposed to talk to me about your shit, because it’s my shit too.” He adds a perfunctory, “Asshole.”

 

He’s still not entirely sure what Adam’s trying to get at here, but the feeling inside of him is too big and ugly to just ask what Adam wants. “I talked to Opal, Jesus. I’m fine now. I don’t know what you’re so fucked up about.” His sharp-edged words seem to visibly hurt Adam, which makes Ronan feel more guilty than he cares to say. Still, he’s angry and Adam’s angry and they have to get this out if they ever want to move on, because that’s how Adam-and-Ronan works.

 

Adam scoffs. “God, I don’t understand you sometimes, you know that? I’m glad you talked to Opal, alright? I just want you to be safe, but I can’t help you if you don’t want help, Ronan. I don’t want to have to dig you an early grave, is that fucking good enough for you?”

 

“Me going out to the forest isn’t dangerous or life threatening or whatever the hell you’re on about, fuck off, Parrish,” he snarls. “It’s suffocating in here. Do I not have your permission to do what I want on my own goddamn property?”

 

Adam takes a deep breath. “I’m not saying you’re going to die if you go outside alone,” he says. His voice is raggedly calm, like he’s trying his hardest to keep his voice even, but only succeeding slightly. “But you almost did a few days ago, and now you can barely go half the day without having to lie down and half your body is torn to shreds. I’m fucking sorry if I’m suffocating you, but if something happens when I could do something about it but you won’t _let_ me, what am I supposed to think? What if you fell asleep out there and dreamed something up and then you couldn’t fight it because you’re too tired? What would happen, Ronan?”

 

Ronan stays silent. If he answers the question, he’ll prove Adam’s point. He settles for glaring a hole through Adam’s skull

 

“That’s why I’m worried, dumbass. You’d fucking die.” He crosses the bed and sits beside Ronan, close but not touching. His Henrietta accent is out in full force. It has been for a while, in fact, but Ronan had been too distracted until now to notice. “Just talk to me next time. I’m not going anywhere.” Ronan longs to lick the drawn out vowels from Adam’s mouth, so he does. Adam laughs, but kisses Ronan back. Maybe Ronan isn’t the only weak one.

 

Eventually, though, Adam pulls away. “You can’t do that again.” He’s still close enough that Ronan can feel the warmth of his breath.

 

“If you don’t scry, I’ll stop running off alone until I can stay awake for one whole day,” Ronan promises, and then adds, “Will you fuck off now?” Just because his first admission hadn’t been angry enough. Adam rolls his eyes and pulls Ronan on top of him, and then Ronan doesn’t have to talk for a long while.

  


 

Dinner looms ahead of them like a dark shadow. Ronan would prefer for Cheng to stay stowed away in Declan’s old bedroom until the end of time, maybe, but he’s got to face the music at some point. 

 

The thing that is worrying him most, surprisingly, is how to act around Adam. Ronan and Adam are not afraid of PDA. In fact, if you looked up PDA in the dictionary, you would probably find a picture of them in lieu of a definition. However, Henry is a raven boy. Granted, he is a raven boy with a boyfriend, but a raven boy all the same. Ronan and Adam have plenty of experience with raven boys commenting on their relationship, and not once have those comments been positive. Even over Skype, Henry had seemed surprised that Adam and Ronan were dating. He seemed to think that Adam could do better than Ronan, which is an unfortunately common occurrence. Ronan pretends it doesn’t bother him. 

 

Ronan makes pasta as Adam watches, because if there’s one area Adam doesn’t excel in, it’s cooking. Adam argues this every time Ronan brings it up, but Ronan refuses to back down on the principle that _edible_ isn’t the same as _good_. 

 

Eventually, they can’t put it off any longer. Adam plucks Opal out of a rousing argument with Chainsaw conveyed entirely through bird screeches and calls Cheng and Gansey for dinner while Ronan sets the table. Once everyone is seated, Ronan steadfastly refuses to look at anyone or anything that isn’t Adam or his food. This awkward silence lasts until Opal says, “Kerah, who is that?”

 

Ronan sees Cheng mouth _Kerah_ to himself with confusion. “This is Gansey’s boyfriend,” he explains. “Be fucking nice. He’s staying here.”

 

Opal frowns. She continues to eat the pasta with no regard for her table manners and says nothing more. 

 

“Lynch,” Cheng finally says. “How did you end up a teen mom?” The question is layered. Cheng knows that for Opal to be the age she appears, she can’t be Ronan’s biological child; the whole town, including Cheng, would have known about her the minute she was born if that were the case. Cheng also knows that Opal has goat legs and that her name for Ronan is a bird noise. He’s leaving the ball in Ronan’s court.

 

“I pulled her from my dreams,” Ronan replies, raising an eyebrow as if daring Cheng to challenge him.

 

Cheng doesn’t. “Of course,” he says evenly, as if he truly believes Ronan is magic and that that is the most normal thing in the world. “What have you two been up to since graduating?”

 

Adam, unsurprisingly, answers, “School and work, mostly.”

 

Ronan says, “I didn’t graduate.”

 

Cheng is once again unfazed. “I always wondered why you stayed there.” And then the table falls oddly silent, because everyone (except Gansey, of course) knows that Ronan went to Aglionby because his father wanted him to. 

 

“Where are you these days?” Adam asks politely. Ronan sees the tension in his shoulders and tangles their feet together beneath the table.

 

“I moved to D.C. after leaving Henrietta, and I’ve been there since. I took a gap year instead of going straight to school, though, so I’ve been travelling this year.”

 

The conversation goes in boring, predictable circles. Ronan participates as little as possible. He’s still deeply wary of Cheng and a dinner of awkward silences filled in by only marginally less awkward small talk will do nothing to change that.

 

Once they’re finished dinner, though, once all the dishes are washed and put away, Cheng asks, “I don’t mean to be intrusive, but I’d like to know why your daughter is a satyr.”

 

Ronan does not like this one bit. Cheng doesn’t want to know if he’s _allowed_ to know why his child isn’t normal, he’s demanding it. He lifts Opal up onto his hip and kisses the top of her head. He tries his hardest to make the worry in her eyes disappear by sheer force of will. “I told you already. I dreamt her.” 

 

Cheng rolls his eyes. “Don’t try to—”

 

“Don’t accuse me of lying, douchebag. If you can’t handle this shit, get the fuck out of my house. I don’t have time for that bullshit. You walked into this, now you have to deal with it.” He clutches Opal tighter, as if that could protect her from Cheng’s curiosity. Adam’s hand rests at the small of his back; it’s a calming gesture, but Ronan does not feel calm. He feels many emotions all at once and all very intense: fury, frustration, resignation, exasperation. Henry is only really a part of their fucked up situation by proxy, yet Ronan once again has to reveal his deepest fucking secrets to a near stranger, and this stranger won’t even _listen_. 

 

Cheng looks to Gansey and Adam, presumably searching for a rational explanation, or perhaps just a rational person. This, impossibly, infuriates Ronan even more. He’s fucking tired of everything he says being ignored by nearly everyone just because he shouts it. Ronan feels everything messily and intensely and all too much and he _knows_ that, he knows, okay? But being treated like a child because talking is not his preferred method of communication gets old fast. “You can believe me or not, fuck if I care. Fuck this shit.” And then he puts Opal down and storms off. 

 

Or, he tries to; then, the power goes off. 

 

The thing about the Barns is that its interior was created by Niall Lynch’s dream magic. Among other things, this means that the house is entirely run by some mysterious, bottomless source of dream energy. It’s for this reason Adam shouts, “Ronan!” as soon as he realizes what’s going on. It’s for this reason Opal lets out a terrified screech of fear. He expects to hear her hooves clacking on the hardwood, but the sound never comes.

 

“Opal,” he breathes, because once he reaches her, she’s barely breathing. He suspects Chainsaw is in the same state somewhere, along with all of his other dream creations. _Matthew_ is off frozen somewhere. Ronan doesn’t cry, but it’s a close thing. 

 

“Ronan, it’s all gone. Cabeswater’s silent,” Adam says desperately. Ronan remembers Adam telling him once that having Cabeswater in his mind all the time was just like having a fridge or washing machine on; it was background noise, something you only noticed if it got louder or went silent. Ronan also remembers being at a friend’s house when the power went out, when he was young enough to still have friends. He remembers the silence being so deafening it was scary.

 

He scoops Opal up in his arms and presses himself into Adam’s right side so Adam will be able to hear him. “Do you know what’s going on?” Ronan asks, though he already knows the answer. 

 

“No,” Adam says, and Ronan hears the _but_. He doesn’t like how it sounds.

 

“Isn’t there any other way?” He doesn’t want Adam to scry, he’s terrified already and that will make everything a hundred times worse but Opal is frighteningly still in his arms, and he’s not going to let his kid fucking die when there’s some way it could have been prevented. At least, this is what he tells himself while Adam fumbles around in the dark for a bowl and fills it with the cranberry juice from the fridge. He sits by the window so the moonlight seeps in enough for him to see. Usually, when Adam scries, Ronan sits with Adam between his legs to ground Adam as much as possible. Now, though, Opal is in his lap, so he settles for pressing himself flush against Adam’s side. Adam stares intently into the liquid and just like that, he’s gone. 

 

Gansey and Cheng stand a few feet away from where Ronan is crowded together with his unresponsive boyfriend and catatonic daughter. He feels completely and utterly useless as he waits for some sign that Opal will wake up, or that Adam needs to be awoken. It feels like time isn’t passing as fast as it should be; for all Ronan knows, it isn’t. 

 

Ronan feels liquid coming out of his nose. He reaches up to wipe the blood away, but his hand comes away black. He starts; he’s seen this before. It was coming out of the tree in Cabeswater, but even then it had seemed familiar. It hits him very suddenly: Opal. 

 

Ronan took Opal from his dreams the beginning of the summer before Adam left for college. He’d been having a nightmare, though this time it wasn’t him getting hurt. It was Opal. It wasn’t the first time that that had happened, but something about that dream was particularly dangerous. Opal was struggling against some invisible force Ronan couldn’t protect her from, but it wasn’t until she started bleeding black that he was certain she would die permanently if he didn’t save her. Now, the same stuff is dripping from Ronan’s face. He feels it on his ears now, too, oozing down his neck. 

 

The seconds tick by as slow as molasses. Ronan wonders how long it takes for whatever’s causing the black stuff to kill him. Suddenly, _finally_ the lights flicker back on and Opal gasps awake and shouts, “Adam!” 

 

Ronan shakes Adam, but it does nothing. Cold terror holds him in its icy claws, forbidding him from moving from his spot at Adam’s side. “Go get me a knife,” he orders Opal, carefully ignoring the fear in her eyes when she runs off to the kitchen, hooves clicking against the hardwood in a way that’s almost unsettling against the backdrop of absolute silence.

 

Once Opal gives him the knife, he takes Adam’s hand and makes a shallow cut in his palm before he can think about it. Luckily, Adam snaps out of it before Ronan has to go any farther than that. Relief like nothing he’s ever felt floods through Ronan when Adam’s empty eyes blink back to life. He looks at the cut on his hand and accuses, “You did it there so you could pay more attention to my hands when you play nurse.”

 

It is absolutely the wrong thing to say. Ronan’s too anxious to joke about anything. Inexplicably, though, he laughs. “You’re not denying it,” Adam says. Ronan leans his head on Adam’ shoulder.

 

“I’m sorry.” Ronan says it even though it will frustrate Adam, but he has to get it out or he might explode.

 

Adam smacks him lightly in the arm. “I needed you to do it, idiot. I don’t think I would have been able to get out without you.” 

 

“That doesn’t make me feel any better, Parrish.” 

 

Adam presses his uninjured hand to Ronan’s neck, a touch he relishes until he remembers what happened while Adam was out. “What’s this?” A pause. “The tree, in Cabeswater. This was coming out of it.”

 

Ronan moves Adam’s hand up to his cheek and keeps a loose grip on Adam’s wrist, ignoring the black stuff he’s surely smudging around. He sighs heavily and explains the dream he took Opal from. “I won’t let this happen again,” Adam promises, eyes skating over Ronan’s stained face. Ronan nods and lets go of Adam’s wrist before leaning heavily into his side. Adam wraps an arm around his waist. Ronan’s too comfortable to care about the gross sludge covering him.

 

Ronan has a feeling Cheng is about to ask an inane question, so he says, “We should call Blue.” By this, he means Adam should call Blue. Adam nods and goes upstairs to find his phone. Ronan beckons Opal into his lap and she complies without hesitation. He runs his hands through her wispy blonde hair to calm himself as much as her.

 

When Adam returns, he shows Ronan his phone. It says there are four missed calls from one Declan Lynch. Adam calls him back. They both know it’s about Matthew.

 

The line barely rings once before Declan answers. Unsurprisingly, he asks for Ronan. 

 

“Ronan, what the fuck happened? Are you okay?” Declan’s voice is frenzied.

 

“Is Matthew okay? Is he back?” Sometimes, in secret, frantic moments like this, Ronan wishes he and Declan could have a normal relationship. He wants to know if Matthew’s okay without any stupid games or arguments. 

 

“He’s fine now. Tell me what happened! Fuck, can you not be difficult for one goddamn minute, this is important.” 

 

Ronan knows full well Declan is worried out of his mind. Even if the two older Lynches can’t be in the same room without a fight breaking out, they do have one thing in common: their unconditional love for their little brother. Declan has no way of knowing what’s happening with the ley line, so if Matthew went slack and frozen, the only reasonable assumption for him to make would be _Ronan’s dead_. It’s not unreasonable; the same thing happened to Niall’s creations when he died. “I’m fine. Nothing happened.” 

 

Declan sighs heavily. Ronan can imagine him placing his thumb and forefinger on the bridge of his nose like an inconvenienced CEO with better things to do. “Bullshit, Ronan. Tell me what happened. I’m not going through this again.”

 

And maybe it’s the thought of Declan being the last surviving Lynch if something happens to Ronan, or maybe it’s their shared love of Matthew. Whatever it is, Ronan puts his guard down, if only for just a few minutes, and talks.

 

♕

 

Later, after the wild night calms down, after the Greywaren and the Magician curl up together in their bed with Orphan Girl nestled between them, Cabeswater wakes up. It wasn’t asleep, not exactly. It wasn’t gone, either. It was there one moment, then it wasn’t. It remembers the Magician pulling it back, but it doesn’t know where it went in the first place. Where it was taken in the first place. Maybe none of this has happened yet, or maybe it’s happening right now.

 

Cabeswater does not feel things, but if it did, it would feel lost.

 

It feels something chipping away at its edges, stealing great swaths of energy from it. It comes and goes in waves. Cabeswater has never experienced anything like this before, not in the past, present, or future. 

 

The darkness flooding over Cabeswater like an ocean tide screams. It sounds like death and undoing, like destruction and unmaking. 

  
Cabeswater is _dying_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Up next: 
> 
> _Suddenly, a librarian appears over Henry’s shoulder. “Could you three keep it down, please?” Her voice is sickly sweet and out of place. She’s startlingly beautiful with blonde hair and piercing green eyes. Her name tag says _Piper_ , which sounds oddly familiar for some reason._


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for a character being gross and disgustingly vulgar. You can probably guess who.

After explaining what happened to the Fox Way clan, Adam feels bone-tired in an entirely different way than he’s used to. Adam Parrish knows exhaustion better than anyone; he worked three jobs to graduate high school. He knows what it’s like to not have a spare minute for days at a time, to work ten times as hard as everyone else on half as much sleep. Despite this, the happiness he thought would come with returning home for the summer is just out of his reach.

 

Since the day Ronan was attacked, it has been four straight days of pinballing between something horrible happening and trying to recover in time for the next catastrophe. Adam just wants to spend time with his family. He wants to slide down the muddy hills by the pasture on toboggans with Ronan and fuck around with dollies in empty parking lots. He wants to chase Opal around the yard and pretend not to know she lets him catch her. 

 

Is happiness too much to ask for? He thinks he’s done enough time to have earned it by now.

 

Adam is sitting on the fence that encloses the pen of Ronan’s saffron yellow goat-adjacent creatures. Ronan and Opal are milking them, which seems pointless to Adam; as a rule, they never consume dreamstuff. The risk of magical food poisoning is too high to properly enjoy Cabeswater food, even if the shimmery gold goat milk looks very, very tempting. This is what happiness looks like: spending time with his impossible family on their impossible farm surrounded by impossible beauty.

 

Adam doesn’t feel happy, though.

 

That’s not quite right. He _is_ happy. He can’t remember the last time he felt this grossly content, actually, but there’s an electrifying undercurrent of paranoia that stops Adam from enjoying it. Any second, Adam could topple off the fence and see Cabeswater dead and blackened all around him. Any second, Opal, Chainsaw, and the yellow goats could go static and unresponsive. Not to mention the bloody gashes adorning Ronan’s body, the ones Ronan refuses to let heal.

 

Adam is tired of being a broken thing. Though he resents thinking of himself as a victim, it’s the best word to describe him sometimes. He’s a victim of his circumstances. He fought his way up and out, but the past will always be there to drag him down, as is becoming increasingly evident. He’s just come back from his first year at fucking Harvard to the love of his life and their daughter. And yet, just last night Opal almost slipped out of their hands. Adam’s spent his life making sure he always had a solid rock to stand on; now, he feels like he’s on the edge of a precipice.

 

“Thirsty?” Ronan, probably deliberately, interrupts Adam’s spiralling thoughts. He holds an overflowing pail of the golden goat milk, eyebrows raised in the shape of an accusation.

 

“I’m fine,” Adam assures him, eyeing the milk skeptically.

 

Ronan narrows his eyes. “No.”

 

Despite Adam knowing exactly what Ronan is talking about, Adam replies, “I don’t want magic-induced food poisoning.”

 

Ronan puts down the goat milk in favour of placing his hands on Adam’s hips. “Fuck off. Lying is a sin.”

 

“Good thing I’m not Catholic.” He jumps down from his perch on the fence and leans back against it faux-casually. Ronan’s hands resume their position.

 

Ronan glares and rolls his eyes. This dance is practiced and familiar: Adam will refuse to admit what’s bothering him, and Ronan will refuse to outright ask. They’ll make out angrily about it when no one wants to talk and then eventually it’ll boil into a fight that turns into a genuine conversation about gross things like feelings. Adam doesn’t feel like it today, though; he doesn’t want to dance around what’s bothering him, he just wants it to _stop_.

 

“I’m scared,” he admits. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this.”

 

Ronan’s hands tighten on Adam’s hips. “We’ll be fine, Parrish. We have the whole goddamn summer ahead of us.”

 

It’s pretty meaningless, as far as reassurances go. Adam knows Ronan can’t really tell him everything will be alright, because they don’t know if that’s true, no matter how much they want it to be. Still, Adam does feel better —  maybe it’s the way Ronan casually throws around the first person plural, like some implicit assurance that they’ll face what comes next together. Adam presses a quick kiss to Ronan’s lips before ducking out of Ronan’s grasp and upending the contents of the milk bucket on him. Ronan hisses and tackles Adam to the ground, smearing the sticky gold liquid all over him. And just like that, they’re teenagers again; the weight of their unreality is momentarily dissipated. 

 

Adam flips Ronan over and pulls him into a headlock. Ronan quickly escapes, but before he can make another move, Adam gets up and vaults over the fence. He tears off; Ronan may have more brute strength, but Adam is _fast_. Eventually, once Ronan has chased all the breath from his lungs, Adam stops abruptly and lets Ronan crash into him. Ronan lets out a poetic litany of expletives which Adam finds unfairly attractive.

 

“Fucking dick,” Ronan snaps with a rare, unquenchable smile.

 

“Asshole,” Adam retorts, not quite sure if he’d like to continue staring at one of Ronan’s elusive unabashed grins or kiss it off of his face. Ronan takes advantage of this distracted moment of revelry and shoves Adam back against the wall of the barn behind him. Adam is not so foolish to think Ronan’s going to do something nice, like kiss him, something Adam is positively dying for, especially when Ronan lifts him a few inches off the ground. Adam puts his hands in Ronan’s back pockets and hauls him close before shoving one of his legs between Ronan’s, just to rile him up. He allows Ronan to enjoy it for only a second before breaking out of his hold and tackling him to the ground.

 

It’s in this position Gansey and Cheng happen upon them: Adam straddling Ronan’s thighs in an effort to keep him subdued, grabbing Ronan’s wrists to hold him down on the ground, only mostly succeeding. Though they’re rather obviously wrestling, it’s a compromising position; Adam braces himself for the jab.

 

“Didn’t take you for exhibitionists,” Cheng says as if he were commenting on the weather.

 

Ronan bares his teeth. “Didn’t take you for voyeurs.” Adam doesn’t move, except for letting go of Ronan’s wrists. Ronan takes this opportunity to sit up, which puts Adam and Ronan in close enough proximity for Gansey to blush. Adam grins into Ronan’s shoulder.

 

“I don’t suppose you’d like to come to the library with us?” Cheng asks with a cocked eyebrow. Adam interprets this as them asking for permission to go to the library, because he’s sure Gansey at the very least is dying to go somewhere other than the Barns and Fox Way. 

 

“The fuck are you going to the library for?” Ronan says the word _library_ in the same tone he would _Aglionby_ or _Declan_.

 

“To read about ley lines!” Gansey says in such a way that Adam can hear the exclamation point. “Blue’s accompanying us.” Adam rolls his eyes into Ronan’s neck. 

 

“Though that is a tempting offer,” Ronan replies, “fuck no, fuck off.” This is partly because Ronan wouldn’t be caught dead in a place that wants you to _read_ and also be quiet about it, partly because Adam’s already read everything there is to read in Henrietta’s tiny library on the supernatural, but mostly because Ronan has had no real alone time with Adam since Gansey’s arrival.

 

“I’m not sure I could trust you not to get up to any funny business in the stacks, anyhow,” Cheng says airily. 

 

Adam scoffs. He doesn’t dignify that with an answer, just leans in close to Ronan, buries his face in the crook of Ronan’s neck. It’s a show of soft intimacy so obscene he hears Cheng cough uncomfortably; they make some excuse to leave. 

 

Ronan shouts, “Stay gone for as long as possible, assholes!” before wrapping his arms around Adam’s waist. “There were a hundred less gay ways to make them go away.”

 

“I don’t think it’s in your best interests for me to be less gay, you know,” Adam points out. 

 

“Shut the fuck up.”

 

♕

 

Henry, Gansey, and Blue are crowded around a small table near the back of the tiny library. Blue is watching Henry with an indecipherable expression on her face, which Gansey does not like. He wants them to like each other so badly it scares him a little.

 

“Aren’t you glad to be out of the house?” Henry stage-whispers as Gansey combs through a brick-sized tome on the correlation between people with ESP and strange, unexplainable events. It’s not terribly interesting, but the selection at the Henrietta Public Library leaves something to be desired. 

 

Gansey nods distractedly at Henry’s prodding. He’s been slowly going stir-crazy, but he’s too polite to say anything about it to Adam and Ronan. “I mean, the show they were putting on when we left. You’d think they’ll die if they ever once let go of one another,” Henry continues. “And so inscrutable.”

 

Gansey shrugs. He’s gotten to know Adam and Ronan well enough by now to know they’ve been through a lot together, though this was never explicitly stated. It was communicated through Ronan trailing off in the middle of a sentence once he remembered Gansey was there, or Adam outright refusing to explain anything to do with how he came to be the Magician, all the while sharing a Look with Ronan. They also fastidiously skirt the subject of how they woke the ley line, though Gansey has asked many, many times.“They’re letting us stay with them, be grateful,” he chides Henry, though he agrees, at least somewhat.

 

Henry doesn’t either doesn’t respond to or doesn’t care about what Gansey said. He forges on, apparently unaware of the slowly darkening look on Blue’s face. “I don’t think I’ve ever met a more serious couple of nineteen year olds. They’re so different from Aglionby.”

 

Blue scoffs. “You’ve talked to them for what, twelve hours?”

 

“First impressions are rarely wrong,” Henry says in a singsong voice. A patron a few feet away from them glares.

 

“I’m sorry you’ve had to meet them again when we’re in a potentially life-threatening situation, one that is even more dangerous for Ronan and Adam,” Blue sneers, “that must be horrible for you.”

 

Henry has the grace to look apologetic. 

 

Gansey cuts in, “They can’t be too serious. We found them wrestling covered in some gold substance before we left.”

 

Henry snorts. “Wrestling.” 

 

Blue ignores him and nods like she understands. “The goat milk.”

 

Gansey has no idea what she could possibly be talking about, but nods. 

 

“I don’t _appreciate_ you guys talking about my friends like some science experiment,” Blue says venomously. 

 

“If you found the two most mysterious enigmas from your high school days shacked up together living in domestic bliss, what would _you_ think?” Henry demands, apparently incapable of whispering.

 

Blue rolls her eyes. “Public school doesn’t have enigmas. It has rednecks.” She pauses almost hesitantly and adds sharply, “Don’t say anything like this to them, if you want to keep your balls attached to your body. People aren’t zoo animals for you to poke at.”

 

Henry frowns. “What kind of person do you think I am, miss Sargent?” It’s mostly a joke, if Gansey’s reading Henry’s face right.

 

“I don’t trust Aglionby boys,” Blue says simply.

 

“I hate to be the one to tell you this, but your two BFFs are just as Aglionby as I am, if not more. I only went there for two years,” Henry replies archly.

 

“They’re not like you, and you know it,” Blue argues.

 

“Point.” He adjusts his perfect hair awkwardly.

 

Gansey understands what Blue means. He knows bits and pieces about Aglionby from what Henry’s told him. Adam doesn’t come from the sort of money a private school like Aglionby would require, and it’s hard to imagine Ronan in any kind of educational institution, let alone one that mandated ties and button-ups. The three of them fall silent, but Gansey can no longer concentrate on the dusty book laid on the table before him. Finally, he says, “I would like to get to know them better, but they aren’t very sociable.”

 

Blue snorts. “Yeah, well.”

 

Suddenly, a librarian appears over Henry’s shoulder. “Could you three keep it down, please?” Her voice is sickly sweet and out of place. She’s startlingly beautiful with blonde hair and piercing green eyes. Her name tag says _Piper_ , which sounds oddly familiar for some reason.

 

“Of course, ma’am,” Gansey promises. Once she leaves, he shares a look with Blue.

 

“Her name seems…” Blue’s eyes are cast up at the ceiling in thought.

 

“Familiar,” Gansey finishes. “But from where?”

 

“There’s thousands and thousands of Pipers out there,” Blue reasons, though the doubt in her voice is contradictory. Gansey doesn’t think it’s just a coincidence either. They’re in far too dangerous a situation to write off incidents like this. 

 

Henry, though he must have no idea what on Earth Gansey and Blue are talking about, says, “Maybe we should leave.”

 

Blue nods in agreement. Gansey wishes he could have had more time to pore over the (albeit lackluster) shelves of the library, but he doesn’t feel comfortable anymore. He shuts the book. 

  
  
  


 

They arrive at 300 Fox Way with little fanfare. Gansey supposes that’s expected; if Blue is telling the truth, and he has no reason to doubt her, the women of the house knew they were coming before they arrived. 

 

“You seem peaked,” Maura says to Gansey once they settle at the kitchen table, “would you like some tea?” Blue, who’s sitting where Maura can’t see her, shakes her head silently. “Let him decide for himself, Blue,” Maura says. Henry’s eyes widen.

 

“That would be nice, thank you, Mrs. Sargent,” Gansey replies. He’s not sure what’s in store for him, but he wouldn’t like to be impolite.

 

“Mom, this is Henry Cheng. He’s Gansey’s boyfriend,” Blue says. “Henry, Mom.”

 

“Maura,” Maura says. “Nice to meet you.”

 

“The pleasure’s all mine,” Henry replies smoothly.

 

“What brings you here, daughter of mine?” Maura asks as she gathers some odd-smelling ingredients from various cupboards.

 

“Do you know anyone named Piper?” Blue asks. “There’s a new librarian and her name sounds familiar.”

 

Maura thinks for a moment before calling out, “Dean!” Mr. Gray, previously seated on the couch and reading the newspaper, sits beside Blue. “Do we know a Piper?”

 

From what Gansey’s seen of him, Mr. Gray’s expression is rarely anything but neutral, but his lips quirk into something like a frown. “I knew a Piper. Greenmantle’s wife, but she died a few years ago.”

 

Gansey frowns. The thought of anyone related to Greenmantle being in such close proximity to him make him shiver. “How do you know she died?” Gansey asks carefully. It should be impossible that Piper Greenmantle is still alive and in Henrietta, but Gansey has a bad, bad feeling.

 

“I heard rumours,” he answers vaguely, “but I was out of the business by then. I assumed it must be true, because there’s no other reason Greenmantle would quit.”

 

“Maybe she lied about her death. We just saw someone at the library named Piper, and it doesn’t feel like a coincidence,” she explains.

 

Mr. Gray hums. “What did she look like?”

 

“She was blonde,” Gansey answers at the exact same time that Blue says, “Super hot.”

 

Mr. Gray laughs. “That does sound like her, and with everything else going on, I wouldn’t be surprised.”

 

Gansey frowns. Everything else? “Do you mean Piper could be involved with Cabeswater?”

 

Mr. Gray makes a vague gesture. “It’s not impossible. She loved magical things, and she definitely wore the pants in that relationship.” When this earns multiple looks of confusion, he explains, “Greenmantle hires men to do his work for him so he doesn’t get his hands dirty. Piper, from what I’ve seen of her, is the opposite.”

 

“So if she _is_ alive,” Henry says slowly, “it would make sense for her to be the one hurting the ley line.” 

 

Mr. Gray nods. “I suppose I won’t be able to take out any books at the library in the near future then.” Blue rolls her eyes with a familial sort of exasperation. Family is not easy to associate with Mr. Gray. It makes Gansey’s head hurt a little, this patchwork family at Fox Way. His own family is wonderful, of course; he has nothing to complain about. But when you grow up with a senator for a mother, this kind of easiness isn’t as common as it should be. It was nothing like this: Maura, Persephone, and Calla being as close as sister in spite of their lack of blood relation, Mr. Gray, the odd man he is, fitting in perfectly, even though everything about him says he shouldn’t. All this Gansey has gleaned from coming to Fox Way only a few times. He thinks secretly, shamefully, that he’d like to have a family like this one day.

 

“We should tell Adam and Ronan,” Blue says.

 

“I don’t feel like going back to their house so soon,” Henry says quickly. “I can only take so much in a day.”

 

Blue rolls her eyes. “We could meet them Nino’s, your highness.” 

 

Henry lights up. “I missed Nino’s! Oh, let’s.” For Gansey’s benefit, he explains, “It’s a pizza place. They have the best iced tea you’ll ever taste.”

 

“It’s really not that good,” Blue argues. 

 

“Let Gansey decide for himself, Blue.”

 

“Leaving so soon?” Maura asks, a little sadly. “You’ll have to come back another time for the tea, Gansey.” She gives him a piercing look. “You need it.”

 

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Sargent, I’ll come back around soon,” he promises. 

 

“Maura, please,” she insists. “I’m not old or married enough to be Mrs. Sargent.”

 

Blue huffs. “Come on, guys.” She drags them away from her mother and announces they’re walking, accepting no objections. She then calls Adam, who does not answer. On her third call, he picks up. He sounds annoyed over the phone, and Gansey can’t help but think that while he and Henry were itching to get out of the house, Adam and Ronan were probably eager to have them gone for a while. He carefully doesn’t think about what they might be doing. 

 

“I don’t want to tell you over the phone, this is important,” Blue snaps at Adam. A pause. “You can fool around with Ronan whenever you want. I know you don’t care if they’re there or not, don’t give me that— Opal’s probably running around the forest. You don’t have to be there for her, and you could take her with us if you’re so— Stop being annoying, God, fine, it’s about Greenmantle.” That shuts Adam up for a minute. “You better be.” She hangs up. “I hate being friends with people who’re dating,” she huffs after an awkward pause. “Especially when they act like an old married couple, but hornier.”

 

Gansey blushes furiously. Henry rolls his eyes and grabs Gansey’s hand. Turning to Blue, he asks, “No special one in your life?”

 

Blue snorts and doesn’t dignify him with an answer.

 

“You’ll find someone someday, Bluebird,” Henry promises. 

 

“I’ll cut your dick off,” she replies coolly. “What makes you think I need a _special one_?”

 

Henry shrugs. “To give Lynch and Parrish a taste of their own medicine, I suppose.”

 

Blue sighs. “They’d probably get grosser for revenge.”

  
  
  


 

Adam and Ronan are already seated in one of the booths at Nino’s. Unsurprisingly, they’re pressed together from shoulder to ankles, arms tangled together on the table. Blue makes a fake gagging motion when she sees them.

 

“You’re just jealous, maggot,” Ronan says, flipping her off with his free hand. Adam rolls his eyes with a kind of fondness Gansey feels like shouldn’t be allowed in public places. 

 

“We already ordered,” Adam says impatiently. “Spill.”

 

Blue crosses her arms. “Hello to you too, Adam. When we were at the library, a librarian came to tell us to be quiet,” Blue starts. Ronan snickers. “Her name tag said Piper, which sounded familiar to me and Gansey, so we went home to ask Mom—”

 

“Piper, like Greenmantle’s wife?” Adam interrupts.

 

Blue raises her eyebrows. “Wish you’d been there with us then, before Gansey almost got subjected to Mom’s tea. Anyway, Dean said if Piper is still alive, it’s pretty likely it could be her messing with Cabeswater through the ley line.” Ronan’s face sours considerably at the name _Dean_ , and it only gets worse as Blue keeps talking.

 

“So Cabeswater’s might not be sick. Someone could be stealing from it.” Adam’s tone is resigned. He sinks farther into Ronan’s side.

 

“Fuck,” Ronan says eloquently.

 

Blue sighs grimly. They’re silent until the pizza arrives; it’s not awkward, but rather dejected. Though Gansey knows almost nothing about this Cabeswater, the thought of someone stealing from a ley line for their own selfish purposes makes him feel sick.

 

“That was all y’all fucking wanted?” Ronan snaps through a mouthful of pizza. The _y’all_ sounds strange in Ronan’s waspish tone. Adam smiles at it.

 

Blue lets out a strangled noise. “Clearly not even being in _Nino’s_ can stop you from touching one another, so I don’t know what you’re so mad about missing out on.”

 

“Maggot, we all know you’re painfully single, but you can’t be that fucking dense,” Ronan retorts with an edge in his voice. 

 

“God, fine, go home if you want. Who needs friends anyway, when you’ve got everything you want wrapped up in one Adam Parrish,” Blue snaps. Gansey’s glad she got mad before Ronan could go into detail on what kind of touching he really meant, but he’s also doesn’t want to see Blue, Ronan, or Adam explode, which currently seems like the most probable outcome of the situation.

 

“Sorry I wanted to have time with my fucking boyfriend after having half of Henrietta basically live in my house.” Ronan does not sound sorry at all.

 

“Boyfriend, huh?” A vaguely Russian-looking stranger suddenly standing over their booth says. “You still two-timing me, Lynch?”

 

♕

 

“Fuck off, Kavinsky,” Ronan growls. Adam grabs his hand beneath the table. “Get the fuck away from me.” He’s not sure if he’s glad Adam’s between Ronan and Kavinsky so Kavinsky can’t touch him or worried because _Kavinsky could hurt Adam_.

 

“Long time no see, baby,” Kavinsky says sweetly. Ronan wants to kill him. Ronan wants him to leave. Ronan wants— he doesn’t know. He wants this to not be happening.

 

“Don’t fucking call me that. Fuck off, asshole.” Ronan’s not entirely sure how he’s putting words together to form coherent sentences. Sure, when he feels like shit, he wants to text Kavinsky, because Kavinsky feels like shit too, like what Ronan deserves in times like that. Seeing him in public, though, with Adam and Blue and Gansey and Henry? He feels like throwing up. He hasn’t truly spoken to Kavinsky in almost a year, and he’s nowhere near prepared. 

 

Kavinsky smiles, all catlike and confident. He’s a storm waiting to break, dark and thunderous and all-encompassing, hanging over Ronan's head like a guillotine. “I miss you, Lynch. I’m so much better for you than this fucking worthless trailer trash, baby, just say the word—”

 

“Shut your fucking mouth, or I swear to God you’ll regret it, motherfucker.” This is more familiar, this roaring anger. He can work with anger. He can beat the fuck out of Kavinsky with anger.

 

Kavinsky frowns. “That’s no way to talk to me. You can’t seriously believe you _belong_ or whatever gay bullshit with this gold-digging motherfucker? Can you still fuck him with that stick up his ass? Or do you let him fuck you, like a little—”

 

“One more word, you goddamn shitbag, I fucking dare you,” he snarls. He doesn’t want to fight Kavinsky in front of Adam, or inside of Nino’s for that matter, but goddamn does he want to punch that stupid smirk off his fucking face.

 

Adam’s hand migrates from Ronan’s hand to the small of his back, just under his shirt. Normally, this has an effect similar to the deflation of a balloon, but nothing could calm Ronan down right now, even Adam. 

 

“You gonna make a scene in this upstanding establishment? Wouldn’t want to get kicked out or anything, I know how much time you two spend here.”

 

The implication that Kavinsky knows what Ronan does, what _Adam_ does is not a pleasant revelation. “Then leave. The fuck do you want, K?”

 

Kavinsky smiles like a cat who got the cream. “We’re going out on Friday, Lynch. Your lapdog will be there, too.”

 

“The fuck he will,” Ronan sneers, “the fuck I will. Fucking go already.”

 

Kavinsky’s lips curl into something vicious. “You know I’m possessive, honey, do you really expect me to leave you alone?” He laughs and turns around. “See you Friday. Pick you up at eight.”

 

With that, he’s gone. Ronan wants to scream or cry, maybe both. Adam pulls him close into a hug, but it sort of feels like that’s happening in another dimension. He thinks he hears Adam say to someone, “We’ll pay you back for the pizza.” He’s a little less out of it when Adam leads him to the passenger seat of the BMW. He sits down without complaint; he doesn’t trust himself to drive, though he desperately wants to.

 

After a few infinite seconds of silence, Adam asks, “Are you okay?”

 

This jerks Ronan fully back into the waking world. He wants to burn something, or crash his car, or maybe go follow Kavinsky even though the thought makes him queasy. He doesn’t answer Adam, just shuts his eyes and balls up his fists so he doesn’t do something stupid like break the window. Adam starts playing Ronan’s music, the stuff he calls white noise that costs money, and Ronan falls in love a little bit more. 

 

They arrive at the Barns. Usually, Ronan ribs Adam about how slowly he drives, but Ronan’s honestly not sure how long they were in the car for. Adam takes his hand and leads him inside, upstairs to the bedroom. Ronan kicks his jeans off and takes off his shirt before collapsing into bed. Adam soon follows.

  
“Hey,” Adam asks, “what happened back there?”

 

Ronan, in a true Ronan fashion, says, “I dunno, shithead.” He burrows his face into the crook of Adam’s neck and wraps his arms around Adam’s torso. Adam tangles their legs together, and _this_ is maybe the only thing that could make Ronan feel better right now. He relishes every point of contact, relishes Adam’s hands gently tracing Ronan’s tattoo, relishes security he thinks he shouldn’t be feeling. More than anything, he feels understood. Adam knows he doesn’t want to talk shit out. Sure, they’ll have to discuss what Kavinsky said later, but right now, Adam knows that this is the best way for Ronan to depressurize before he blows up. 

 

Eventually, Ronan whispers into Adam’s collarbone, “Sorry he said all that shit about you.”

 

“Not your fault, dumbass,” Adam says. He presses a kiss to Ronan’s forehead. “I’m sorry he turned up at all.”

 

“Not your fault, dumbass,” Ronan echoes. “Knew we shoulda stayed home.”

 

Adam hums in agreement. “Never wanna leave here.”

 

“Me too,” Ronan says. “No homo though.”

 

“Fuck you,” Adam hisses, shoving Ronan lightly in the shoulder.

 

“Maybe later.”

 

“Asshole,” Adam says, “love you.”

 

“Love you too.” Ronan thinks he could burst from this feeling. Not fifteen minutes ago he thought he was going to explode and scream at Adam and maybe burn some shit to the ground, and that still hasn’t dissipated, but now it’s smothered by this feeling of contentment, of love.

 

Ronan kisses Adam’s neck. “You think it’s later yet?”

 

Adam laughs. “You fucking teenager.”

 

“Well. Yeah.”

 

Just then, the door to the Barns creaks open. Adam groans. 

 

“Fuck them,” Ronan mutters.

 

“I think the point is to fuck you, Lynch.”

 

Ronan falls silent. He goes outside of himself, just a little. Thinks of Kavinsky. _I’m much better for you than this fucking worthless trailer trash_. 

 

Adam frowns. “Is there anything I can do?”

 

“No. Yes.” He growls in frustration. “I don’t fucking know.” A pause. “You heard him.” It means nothing and everything. Ronan’s can’t decide if he’s happy to be in Adam’s arms or tearing himself apart with anger. 

 

Adam’s hands brush against Ronan’s scalp. His chest is going to burst into a thousand flaming pieces.

 

“Get dressed, we have news,” Cheng shouts.

 

Ronan wants to shout _FUCK OFF, CHENG_ , but talking (except maybe to Adam) is not on the table for him right now. Adam, with a sigh of irritation loud enough to be heard from outside their room, sits up and replies, “Come in.” Ronan doesn’t have the energy care about whatever’s happening right now, so he closes his eyes and lets himself become dead weight. Adam shifts so he can wrap his arms fully around Ronan. Ronan listens idly to their noisy conversation.

 

Gansey eyes them disdainfully. “We said get dressed.” 

 

Adam glares. “If you wanted us to be clothed, you shouldn’t have come into our bedroom.” His tone says _duh, dumbass_. Cheng, as usual, has no shame and sits on the end of the bed.

 

“After you left, Piper came into Nino’s. She looked around but she didn’t notice us, thank God.”

 

“We left out the back so she wouldn’t see us,” Gansey adds. “Blue’s old coworker let us through. But she was talking to someone on the phone about Greenmantle and the ley line.”

 

“So it’s definitely Piper Greenmantle?”

 

“And she’s definitely messing with the ley line.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comment, kudos, etc! Tell me what you thought!
> 
> Up next:
> 
>  
> 
> _The scene is picture-perfect: the wonder is evident in Gansey’s eyes; he’s almost glowing. Cheng stares unabashedly at him with a lazy smile. The sun beats down on them, staining the yellow goats gold. Ronan’s hand in Adam’s is gross with sweat, but he can’t find it in himself to care. “Hey,” Henry says curiously as he points at the goat, “they’ve stopped moving.” Then, everything goes black._


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the late chapter! Yesterday was a busy day. Also, this chapter is probably my favourite one I've written, I hope you enjoy.

Ronan, Adam, Gansey, and Cheng are playing with the goats. 

 

More accurately, Cheng is playing with the goats while Gansey hovers behind him anxiously and Ronan and Adam sit on the fence off to the side. 

 

“I think this one likes me,” Cheng says, grinning.

 

“Skrillex likes everyone, you’re not special,” Ronan replies.

 

“His name is Skrillex?” Henry asks, unperturbed. He’s been exposed to Ronan’s awful music by now, which is why he says, “I’m not surprised.”

 

“I fucking hate Skrillex,” Ronan growls.

 

Cheng scoffs. “You’re a contrary asshole.” Skrillex butts her head into Henry’s hand, which Adam thinks seems pointless because of her horns, but who is he to judge the choices of a dream goat?

 

“Isn’t that what the boys like?” Ronan says in a monotone. 

 

“They just love it when you pull on their pigtails, Lynch,” Adam says sarcastically. 

 

“Clearly it worked on someone,” Ronan says.

 

“Get a room,” Cheng interrupts. Skrillex rams him with her horns. Ronan grins wolfishly. 

 

“Did you create all of these goats?” Gansey asks, crouching in front of Jolene hesitantly. 

 

“Yeah,” Ronan answers. There’s four goats: Skrillex, Jolene, Armageddon, and Adam II. Adam named Skrillex and Jolene. He’d named Skrillex such because he knew it would piss Ronan off, and Ronan’s revenge was Adam II. Adam hopes Cheng and Gansey don’t ask about the names of the remaining two.

 

“Are there any others?” Gansey steels himself to touch Jolene’s fur. She backs up quickly and he shrieks. Ronan laughs.

 

“Not that I’ve made.”

 

Ronan is not his father. It takes a significant amount of magic to take fully functioning living things out of dreams, and Ronan is not a thief. He has taken Matthew and Opal from Cabeswater, but Matthew hadn’t been on purpose, and taking Opal from his dreams had been an extenuating circumstance. Adam hopes that Gansey won’t continue this line of questioning because the inevitability of Niall Lynch becoming a point of conversation is tangible. 

 

Gansey, though, is too smart for his own good. He knows Ronan’s distaste for lying and it’s not hard to tell when someone’s edging around the truth. “Did someone else create any?” 

 

Ronan’s default unpleasant glare turns sharp. “My father.” Adam snakes an arm around Ronan’s waist and leans into him. 

 

“What did he make?” Gansey hasn’t noticed Ronan’s change in mood. He’s locked in a staring contest with Jolene, who is slowly approaching him once again.

 

“Cows.”

 

“So it runs in the family?” Gansey holds a hand out to Jolene’s mouth. She tries to bite him. “Are the cows here?”

 

“They’re in one of the Barns.” Ronan ignores the first question unsubtly. 

 

Gansey, thankfully, doesn’t press any further. Jolene relents and pushes her nose into his hand. He smiles like a child on Christmas morning. Cheng crouches beside Gansey, kicking up mud onto Gansey’s chinos in the process. Adam winces.

 

Sometimes Adam forgets that magic isn’t an everyday thing for most people; he feels it constantly, through Cabeswater’s whispers and Ronan’s trinkets. Adam is the Magician; magic is intrinsic to his very being. He wonders how he’d react if the roles were reversed; Gansey, with his infallible belief in something more, finding Cabeswater instead. Gansey probably wouldn’t have sacrificed himself to the forest. Gansey wouldn’t have had a reason to, anyhow. 

 

The scene is picture-perfect: the wonder is evident in Gansey’s eyes; he’s almost glowing. Cheng stares unabashedly at him with a lazy smile. The sun beats down on them, staining the yellow goats gold. Ronan’s hand in Adam’s is gross with sweat, but he can’t find it in himself to care. “Hey,” Henry says curiously as he points at Skrillex, “they’ve stopped moving.” Then, everything goes black.

 

It’s not the same kind of black as his last vision from Cabeswater. It doesn’t fade into gray and no shapes emerge from the dark. He brings his hands up to his face, but nothing’s blocking his vision. He’s just – blind, for some reason. He reaches for Ronan again, but this throws him off balance and he starts to topple forward off the fence. Someone catches him before he can hit the ground, and Adam hopes it’s Ronan because he wraps his arms around his waist. It _feels_ like Ronan, so Adam says, “Ronan, I can’t _see_.” His voice cracks at the end but he doesn’t cry, though it’s a close thing. He carefully doesn’t think about how he only has one ear to rely on without his eyes.

 

Adam feels Ronan’s sharp exhale of breath. “Fuck.” 

 

Suddenly, Adam realizes what’s happening. “I am its eyes, remember?” He whispers to Ronan. Ronan hisses again once he connects the dots Adam has – if Cabeswater is taking Adam’s eyes, then it’s in trouble. Not only that, but it’s capable of using Adam’s sacrifice like that, which is uncomfortable at best and horrifying at worst. _P_ _aenitet_ , Cabeswater says in Adam’s mind. _Sorry_. 

 

“Fucking Cabeswater,” Ronan mutters. “C’mon, let's go inside. I’ll help you.” Adam doesn’t like the thought of having to be helped walking, but the goat pen is very far from the main house.

 

Adam feels Cabeswater pulsing in the forefront of his mind. It’s ten times as loud as usual but ten times as weak. He can feel its fear triggered by whatever Piper’s doing to try and take its energy, feels the fear leaking into him like an oil spill. It makes it infinitely more difficult to stumble back to the house, especially when Cabeswater’s pain begins to manifest itself as a monstrous headache. 

 

Eventually, after an embarrassingly long time, they reach their destination. Ronan deposits Adam on the couch and goes in search of his phone, presumably to call Blue. Adam whimpers at the loss of contact, not particularly caring whether or not Gansey and Cheng hear him. He’s fucking _scared_ and he can barely hear anything over Cabeswater’s droning and cries of _paenitet, paenitet_. He wants Ronan here to ground him in this world because Cabeswater is overwhelming him, taking up more space in his head ever before. He digs his fingers into the couch cushions to try and remind himself where he is, but it’s futile; the arboreal chorus of _paenitet, paenitet, paenitet_ is more solid than anything else. Adam feels sick.

 

There’s a hand on Adam’s arm now, but it’s not Ronan’s. Adam flinches and the hand moves away, but that’s even worse. “It’s just me,” Gansey’s voice says loudly. “Are you alright?”

 

Adam doesn’t shake his head because the pressure in his head is building exponentially, but he says, “Gansey,” so quietly it’s almost inaudible. Gansey’s shoulder presses against his. Adam finds this unbearably embarrassing, to be honest. It’s one thing to show his helplessness, which wasn’t fun in the first place; it’s quite another to have a quasi-friend try to assuage it in a weirdly intimate way. It’s kind of… nice, though. If Adam ignores his torturous headache and the shame of his need for touch being inflicted on someone other than Ronan, he feels not horrible. Cabeswater’s presence feels less _everywhere_.

 

Eventually, he hears Ronan talking to Blue on the phone. He can pick out snippets, like “ _You and the witches better get over here right the fuck now_ ,” and “ _I don’t know what to do, maggot._ ” Then, “ _I don’t know what the fuck’s going on, is Matthew okay? Breathing?_ ” and “ _Come, I don’t care, just get here quick, asshole_.” After two long, harried conversations, Ronan makes himself comfortable on Adam’s other side and drapes his arm around the back of Adam’s neck. Gansey, surprisingly, doesn’t move away. Adam, even more surprisingly, doesn’t mind. He feels a fourth weight settle onto the couch. 

 

Adam drifts in and out of wakefulness until the Fox Way clan arrives. Well, that’s not quite accurate; he’s never fully asleep, but he’s rarely truly awake, either. He jolts when he hears the door slam and winces at the shouting.

 

“Lynch, where are you?” Blue calls, probably wandering through the entrance to the kitchen. Ronan doesn’t answer and lets her find them in the living room for herself. Calla, Maura, and Persephone follow soon after, if their voices are anything to go by.

 

“Don’t you look cozy, snake,” Calla says. Her voice is loud enough that it makes Adam’s head throb but quiet enough he has to concentrate to understand her. Ronan replies something inaudible. Adam leans his head on Ronan’s shoulder for a moment, but it blocks his good ear and he jerks back up in a panic. He pushes his face into Ronan’s neck instead. 

 

“So, what are we here for?” Maura breaks the silence. 

 

“I told you.” Ronan’s voice is the perfect mixture of exasperation and forced patience. “Adam can’t fucking see.”

 

“Is there anything else? Do you know why?” 

 

This is the part of the conversation where Adam’s supposed to speak up. He knows this somewhere far away, but tangible thoughts are drifting away from him like bubbles, popping before he can reach them. _Paenitet, paenitet, paenitet._

 

Ronan says something quietly into Adam’s ear, but Adam’s not sure what it was. He’d forgotten Ronan was there, now that he thinks about it. That should be worrying, shouldn’t it? 

 

“Parrish, you have to stay with me, okay?” Ronan’s voice says. Ronan’s voice is attached to Ronan’s body, which is possibly beside Adam but he can’t see it and he’s not entirely sure if he can feel it either. Ronan’s pushing Adam’s head off his shoulder now, which Adam might have whined at, but he can’t be sure. A hand cups his face and Adam feels _that_ , so he says, “Mmph.”

 

“Can you tell us what the hell’s going on? Why are you so damn tired?” Ronan’s voice is shaky. That’s not good. Adam wishes he could see him.

 

“‘M not tired,” Adam insists, because he’s not. It’s just so hard to stay anchored in the real world when Cabeswater’s pulling at his consciousness so hard. He doesn’t know how to explain that, though. “It’s hard to stay here, Cabeswater’s so loud, it wants me there. ‘S taking me there.” He pauses. “Ronan, it _hurts_.”

 

Ronan sighs. “I know, sweetheart.” His hand falls and he drops his face into the crook of Adam’s neck, which is nice enough that Adam could just go to sleep. Except, no, he’s not supposed to go to sleep, he’s supposed to _stay with me, okay?_ But Cabeswater’s trying so hard, and Adam’s only human.

 

“What do you mean, it’s taking you there?” Someone who’s not Ronan says. “Get off him, snake, you’re putting him to sleep.” Calla, then.

 

Unfortunately, Ronan does lift his head. Even though Ronan stays at his side, Adam whines. He is absolutely positive that if Ronan moves, he might die. He slurs, “‘S taking my eyes, but it’s not stopping.” It’s this that snaps Adam out of his dreamlike state; Cabeswater’s not stopping. It’s not going to stop. He goes rigid. “It’s not stopping, I don’t know how to stop it, I can’t–” He stops because even though he’s _awake_ now, his words are still slurred and he can’t think, Cabeswater’s taking and taking and taking, all the while screaming _paenitet, paenitet, paenitet_. He almost wishes he was half-asleep again. What happens when Cabeswater runs out of Adam to take?

 

“Cabeswater’s using Adam to fight whatever’s trying to steal from it, but it’s taking too fucking much, I think. You goddamn witches must know something we can do, right?” Ronan’s voice cracks with desperation. 

 

“Adam, I need you to try the techniques we taught you for blocking a psychic attack, okay?” That sounds like Maura. “It might hurt, but you have to try.”

 

Adam’s a little fuzzy on what to do in a psychic attack. Even if he could think clearly, he hasn’t exactly needed to do this before. He imagines himself in a bubble, imagines Cabeswater outside of it. He imagines pushing the boundaries farther and farther away from himself, and it works for a few seconds. It bounces back, though, and with it returns his headache, more painful than ever. _Paenitet, paenitet, paenitet_. He tries again; it lasts a few seconds more. “It’s not working,” he mumbles. 

 

“Keep trying. I know you can. You’re not giving up, asshole.” It’s so _hard_ to fight, but Ronan wants him to. He tries once again to push Cabeswater back, uses all the strength left in his nearly-empty body and _shoves._ Suddenly, Cabeswater screams; there’s a feeling like a train screeching to a halt. It retreats back to the fringe of Adam’s consciousness where it usually resides. Something’s still wrong, though; Cabeswater still isn’t back to normal. It’s miles above normal, in fact. It’s louder than before. Maura, Calla, and Persephone all start talking at once. Adam, however, is content to ignore this development for a while because his vision is returning. It comes slowly, then all at once. Adam could cry of relief.

 

“Ronan,” he breathes, looking straight into Ronan’s eyes.

 

“Parrish,” Ronan replies. 

 

“Care to stop staring into each others’ eyes and fill us in?” Blue says, glaring. “We’re not all tuned into the Parrish-Lynch wavelength here.”

 

Adam’s not quite sure what there is to explain. There was Adam, and then there was Cabeswater, and now there’s both. “It took my eyes without asking, and now it’s out of control,” he says, which makes at least some sense to everyone but Cheng and Gansey. Turning to face them, he explains, “When I sacrificed myself to Cabeswater, I said I would be its hands and its eyes.”

 

Gansey furrows his brow. “So it’s capable of doing that without your permission?” 

 

Adam huffs. “It is now, apparently.” 

 

“If Cabeswater can take from you, Piper might be able to if she gets full control of the ley line,” Calla points out. “You have to practice your psychic wards, Magician.”

 

“I don’t need a lecture, thanks,” he says. He’s tired and his head feels like it’s being jackhammered, okay? Calla’s pointy eyebrows narrow, but she says nothing.

 

He’s pretty sure Cabeswater’s bouncing back had nothing to do with him. He’s not that strong, after all, especially now. It was like an elastic pulled taut and then let go. Cabeswater’s still running on the power it needed to fight Piper, but now there’s no threat and everything’s still so loud.

 

“No one goes to Cabeswater until this is sorted out, you hear me?” Maura says, staring at Adam. He nods, which is a mistake. A wave of dizziness overtakes him, so intense he cries out. _Pathetic_ , a familiar voice in his head says. “Ronan. Do you know what would happen if you were there when it went dark?” Ronan doesn’t say anything. “No, and we’re not finding out.”

 

“What is Piper doing to the ley line?” Blue asks, giving Adam a look of sympathy he wouldn’t accept from almost anyone else. 

 

“I think it’s a ritual of some kind,” Gansey suggests. “There’s some historic precedent for it, but I won’t get into it now for fear of putting Adam to sleep for real.” He looks like he really, really wants to get into it now. “People who feel like they were dealt a bad hand in life tried to take from the ley lines so they’d finally have power.” Adam doesn’t like this. “Of course, it was different in those times. What could Piper want that she doesn’t have?”

 

Before anyone can reply, Ronan takes Adam’s hand. “We’re going upstairs.” Adam yawns in hopes of convincing everyone it’s his exhaustion making them leave, and not how close to home Gansey hit. 

 

Ronan bridal carries Adam up to their bedroom, instructing everyone else do “do whatever the fuck you want, long as you’re quiet about it.” Before they’re even in bed, though, Adam whispers, “Opal.” 

 

Ronan nods grimly, like he’s thought about it a lot. “She’s pretty damn tough. Declan texted me that Matty woke up, so she’ll probably be here any minute.”

 

“You texted? _Declan_?”

 

“Shut the fuck up.” He drops Adam unceremoniously onto the bed. They’ve barely kicked off their jeans when Opal barrels into the room and jumps into bed with them. Adam makes room for her between himself and Ronan. She smells rank, but it’s okay for now. 

 

“It sounds like dreams,” she says, and it breaks Adam’s heart. Opal hates the dreamworld; she prefers reality, where magical monsters don’t materialize out of nothing and she doesn’t have to save Ronan from unnameable horrors day in and day out. 

 

“This is real,” Ronan promises her. “Cabeswater’s just fucked up right now.”

 

She says nothing more. Ronan hugs Opal and Adam close. Adam feels tired, more physically exhausted than he’s ever been; maybe this is how Ronan felt after his dream monster attacked. He falls asleep despite his headache, into a deep, dreamless sleep.

 

♕

 

Today’s Wednesday. Two days since Kavinsky threatened them, two days till it comes to fruition.

 

Well, according to Adam, K won’t make good on his promise. If Adam and Ronan don’t go wherever the fuck Kavinsky wants them to go, nothing will happen, right? Ronan has a bad feeling about it, though. When Kavinsky told them they would be seeing him soon, it didn’t feel like a choice. It felt inevitable, like a warning rather than an invitation.

 

Adam, the oblivious motherfucker, has no idea what Kavinsky could possibly want with him, which is why he doesn’t believe there’s any true danger. Ronan knows better. If someone wants Ronan, Adam is the best bait. He’s been too scared to inform Adam of this, though; he loves Adam and he knows without a doubt it’s reciprocated, but telling him that he’s Ronan’s greatest weakness is daunting, to say the least. He’s a little glad Adam’s headache is keeping him bedridden, because at least he’s safe in the Barns. He only feels a little guilty for thinking that.

 

Opal and Adam are curled together in such a way that makes Ronan wish he had his phone on him to take a picture. He doesn’t, though, so he uses Adam’s phone instead. He’d slept for a few hours with his arm loosely draped over the both of them, and normally, nothing would please him more than settling back into bed with his family, but his dreams had been vivid and grotesque. 

 

There’s a knock at the door. Ronan carefully gets up and opens it a crack to find Declan. He leaves and shuts the door quietly behind him, not caring to find his pants, and ushers his brother into the old study.

 

As always, Declan is quick to blame Ronan. “What the fuck happened? If Matthew hadn’t stayed home sick today, he would have passed out at school. He only woke up on the drive here. This can’t keep happening, Ronan. It’s not just your life on the line.” It’s so like Declan to be concerned about what it would have looked like if Matthew froze in public, Ronan almost laughs.

 

“I’m well fucking aware. You think I wanted to leave my kid paralyzed alone in the woods? Parrish could have _died_ , you think I did that? Cabeswater’s fucked right now.” Ronan had honestly (maybe) wanted to have a semi-normal conversation with Declan like Declan wanted, but evidently it’s impossible.

 

“What’s wrong with Cabeswater?” Declan asks. Ronan didn’t expect an apology for the assumption that he’d willingly put himself, Opal, and Matthew in danger, but now that he hasn’t got one, he’s even angrier. 

 

“You tell me,” Ronan says.

 

“Fuck you,” Declan replies. “What the hell is going on, Ronan? Don’t bullshit me.”

 

“If you raise your voice you’ll regret it,” Ronan says evenly, “Parrish is trying to sleep off almost dying.” Before Declan can start complaining again, Ronan sighs and explains, “Someone’s fucking with the ley line. Cabeswater. She’s trying to take its energy.”

 

Declan narrows his eyes. “So you know who it is?”

 

“Piper Greenmantle.” 

 

Declan rolls his eyes. “She’s dead, Ronan.”

 

Ronan gasps in mock surprise. “Then her ghost must be haunting us, shitface, because she’s Henrietta’s newest librarian.”

 

“This can’t get any fucking worse.” Declan seems to say this to himself. For Ronan’s benefit, he explains, “Colin Greenmantle’s here too, I should hope you know who he is by now.”

 

This leaves a bitter taste in Ronan’s mouth. That’s what Declan truly came to the Barns for, then. He’d thought… he doesn’t know, but not this. “I’m not fucking leaving,” he says before Declan can make any suggestions ‘for Ronan’s own good’. Every time things go to shit, Declan’s first instinct is to remove Ronan from the danger zone, but he won’t. Even if he could, Henrietta is home.

 

“Don’t be so damn stubborn. It’s what’s best for you. Do you know what would happen if he found you?” 

 

“Fuck off. I’m fine here,” Ronan insists. Nothing in the goddamn world could uproot him from Henrietta, especially not coming from the mouth of Declan. Anyway, they have Cabeswater to take care of, and Ronan doesn’t even want to think about how Opal would behave in a stuffy DC apartment. Declan should know this, if he knows Ronan as well as he seems to think he does. 

 

“I’ve always tried to do my best by you, but this is out of my hands.” Declan takes a deep breath, calming himself. He clenches his fists. “I know this is hard to hear, but it’ll be best if you get out of here. You’re putting everyone here in danger.”

 

This gives Ronan a twinge of guilt, but, “I have shit to take care of.”

 

Declan sneers. “You’re seriously putting that fucking forest above Matthew? And Opal, and… Parrish?”

 

“If that Greenmantle bitch finishes whatever the fuck she’s doing, Opal and Matthew are done,” Ronan snarls. God, he wants nothing more than to punch Declan’s lights out, but Adam’s sleeping just one room over. 

 

“That’s not how it works!” Declan’s losing his cool now. Ronan almost grins. 

 

“How the fuck would you know?” Ronan knows what Declan’s thinking. Dad’s creations all went to sleep after he died, and Ronan’s not dying yet. Is he?

 

“You have to _tell me_!” Declan shouts. “You’re so fucking stubborn.”

 

Ronan grabs Declan’s collar. “I told you to keep your damn voice down,” he growls, curling his lips into a snarl.

 

Declan shoves him back. “Jesus, calm down. I just want to know what’s going on. I’m not asking for much.”

 

“It’s a little late to be asking how I am, dick—” 

 

“Not with your life, dumbass. I want to know what’s going on that’s keeping you _here_.” He gestures grandly around the room, like _here_ is anywhere special. For Declan, it might be. 

 

Ronan narrows his eyes. He doesn’t trust Declan, not as far as he could throw him. There’s always an ulterior motive or something Declan’s not telling him. Declan is a liar, and Ronan is anything but. Declan wants to protect him, but why? To uphold the Lynch reputation? So he can keep Ronan in his sights at all times? It doesn’t make any sense. “Fuck off.”

 

“I thought having Parrish around would mature you a little, but you’re still a child. Maybe if he were here, I could talk to someone rational.”

 

“Well, boo-fucking-hoo for you that Cabeswater just tried to eat Adam’s soul, that must be really horrible for you. Wait, it’s none of your fucking business!” Ronan thinks it’s pretty damn impressive that he hasn’t tried to knock Declan out yet, especially considering his grimace that was nothing short of _disgusted_ as he said Adam’s name.

 

Declan scoffs. “Why’d you call then?” 

  
Ronan’s not sure how to respond to that. He’d called Declan because he was worried about Matthew and wasn’t entirely sure if Adam was going to live to see another day, not that Declan cares. He was fucking terrified, and he thought… maybe Declan could help, or something. Except now Declan thinks Ronan’s messing everything up, just like he always does. “You offered to come. ‘S not my fault your judgement’s fucked.”

 

“I didn’t come here to fight with you, I came here because you sounded scared out of your mind when you called, and you’re my little brother. I’m trying to be patient here, but you’re making it supremely difficult. Use your words.”

 

That was unexpected. It sounded honest, or as close to honesty as Declan Lynch is capable of, which is not very close at all in Ronan’s experience. Still, it’s a (somewhat condescending) olive branch. So Ronan says in a voice so calm he surprises himself, “Adam went blind and then Cabeswater tried to use him to fight Piper, but it went too far and it almost took all of him.”

 

Declan has the grace to look unfazed. “Why will Opal and Matthew go to sleep if Piper finishes what she’s doing?”

 

Ronan shrugs. “Not sure. I think she’s after the ley line, not Cabeswater.”

 

Declan’s eyebrows pinch with annoyance. Ronan bares his teeth. “What’s the difference?”

 

“Cabeswater is a _manifestation_ of the line, or some hippie shit like that,” Ronan says, in a tone of voice that says this is common knowledge, idiot. Declan’s eyebrows furrow further, but he doesn’t make a fuss.

 

“How is Greenmantle related to this?”

 

“I already told you, idiot, she’s—”

 

“Colin Greenmantle.”

 

“Dunno.”

 

Declan stares at him like he’s grown a second head. He opens his mouth to say something, but before he can, Opal tap-tap-taps into the room. Once she sees Declan, she barrels into his arms gleefully, because for some reason she’s always loved him. This irritates Ronan for a great many reasons. At least Declan is chronically awkward around children, especially goat ones, so he’s just as uncomfortable with the situation as Ronan is. Eventually, once it’s clear Opal’s not letting go of his waist, Declan holds her on his hip. 

 

“Adam’s phone’s going off,” she says, as if this is important. “He’s not awake.” When Ronan raises an eyebrow at her, she cries, “Kerah! Go check! Go check go check go check!”

 

Ronan knows Opal, and he knows she won’t relent until he goes. Declan follows him to the master bedroom with a slight frown as they cross the threshold, either because he doesn’t like that Ronan’s taken up residence in their parents’ old bedroom or he doesn’t like the fact that Ronan sleeps here with Adam every night. Ronan’s not sure which option he likes less.

  
True to Opal’s word, Adam’s phone is going off like clockwork. It fell out of his pockets somewhere between being lifted into bed and going to sleep, so the sound is coming from the pile of sheets. Adam sleeps undisturbed. Ronan fishes through the blankets until his hand hits the vibrating phone. 

 

The screen shows tens, maybe hundreds, of text messages from an unknown number. Ronan pretends it’s the content of the messages and not the phone number he has memorized that tells him it’s Kavinsky. He scrolls back to the first ones; they say inane shit like _tell our bf i say hi :* ;)_ and _see u soon bby_. Eventually though, he started to send the same text, over and over: _u won’t b able 2 ignore me soon parrish_.

 

Ronan wants to scream, but Adam is sleeping, so he settles for glaring a hole into the ground. Declan grabs the phone out of his hand and scrolls through the texts. It goes off a few more times, so he mutes it. He looks up. “Who’s sending these?”

 

“Kavinsky.” The name tastes like poison on his tongue.

 

Declan’s already sour expression darkens. “I thought you were done with him.”

 

“It’s not my fucking phone, is it?”

 

“How else would he—”

 

Ronan sneers. “Use that big brain of yours. Why the hell would I give my boyfriend’s phone number to K?” 

 

“Do you think it’s a coincidence he’s texting Parrish _now_?” Declan asks, as if Ronan hasn’t considered this. He can’t think of a connection, apart from the obvious: Kavinsky’s a dreamer too. But Ronan’s made it abundantly clear he’s not a thief, not like K, so he can’t figure out what Kavinsky’s trying to do. If he’s vying for Ronan’s attention through Adam, it’s working, but that doesn’t tell him what Kavinsky _wants_.

 

“Dunno.”

 

Ronan can pinpoint the exact moment Declan’s patience runs out from the way his stormy look turns venomous, which is why it’s not surprising when Declan says, “God, you claim you don’t need any help, but you don’t have the slightest idea what the fuck’s going on around you. Colin Greenmantle’s a half hour drive from you right now, and you don’t even know what he’s doing here. That fucking Kavinsky kid is threatening your precious Parrish and you couldn’t give less of a shit. You never fucking change, Ronan, and I’m tired of it.” Opal jumps out of Declan’s arms and runs downstairs. Ronan wishes he could follow.

 

“Ronan…” Adam slurs. His eyes are half-open and utterly terrified. Ronan’s at his side in a second. “I had a dream,” Adam says.

 

“This isn’t the time for writing in your dream journal,” Declan snaps harshly, face all sharp lines and disappointment. “Ronan, this is your life.”

 

To Ronan’s delight, Adam ignores Declan completely. He props himself up on the pillows and lets Ronan play with his hands. “Cabeswater was there, but it was all black and horrible. An’ it told me to help it, but it was all gone, and then you told me to help you, but you were gone, too.” This doesn’t sound particularly scary or remarkable to Ronan, but Adam looks shaken, so he pulls Adam to his chest and runs a hand through his hair. Adam falls back asleep pretty quickly, but Ronan doesn’t let him go.

 

Ronan whispers, “What are you still doing here, pervert?”

 

Declan rolls his eyes and replies, “I’m sorry your forest is apparently trying to kill you, but Greenmantle’s in Henrietta and he’s got a one track mind right now. I can only do so much. Snap out of your damn domestic bliss and open your eyes. This isn’t going to last.”

 

Ronan’s not sure what scares him more: the sincere concern in Declan’s voice, or the fact that his words are completely, genuinely true.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comment, kudos, etc! Things are heating up, finally. Next chapter's a bit of a change of pace.
> 
> Up next: 
> 
>  
> 
> _Colin Greenmantle rather likes Henrietta._


	10. Chapter 10

Colin Greenmantle rather likes Henrietta. 

 

He doesn’t like the heat so thick he could touch it, and he really doesn’t like the way people he’s never met wave at him on the street. However, he loves the view of the sunset in the front window of the house he’s renting, and the town certainly does have an attractive air about it; if you ignore the filthy parts, it’s an idyllic little pocket of heaven. If he were someone else, maybe he’d settle down here.

 

Colin is not entirely proud of what brought him to Henrietta. Recently, one of his connections informed him that his wife (ex-wife?), whom he thought dead, is _not_ dead and wreaking havoc on some magical forces in small town Virginia. Of course, he packed his bags and drove down as soon as possible, making no noise. Piper can’t _know_ he’s here, not yet. He’s not sure what he’ll do when he finds her, but it’ll come to him.

 

Niall Lynch also lived in the next town over, which might help with his search for the Greywaren.

 

Colin Greenmantle doesn’t like to get his hands dirty, but he _wants_ the Greywaren like nothing else in the world. He was off the map for a while because of Piper’s death, and she was his reason for collecting in the first place. He loved impressing her. But the business of collecting magical artefacts is difficult to escape, and the allure of magic isn’t easy to resist. Besides, Colin loves a good puzzle, and what better puzzle is there than the true nature of the mysterious Greywaren?

 

There are whispers about some disturbance with the ley line around here. Colin found that out with the help of that Harvard kid’s weird notebook and Piper’s old research. He’d decided not to make good on his threats because the kid had been terrified and also mostly useless; there was no mention of the Greywaren in his book. He also didn’t want to have to do anything messy. Usually, he’d have hired someone to go break into the guy’s dorm room, but it’s not that easy when you’re (badly) recovering from the death of your wife and haven’t done anything of importance in literal years.

 

Henrietta is popular among those in search of the supernatural for its frequent otherworldly occurrences, so these whispers about the ley line could be nothing, but there also lies the possibility that they could be something. A Greywaren sort of something. Which would be more helpful if he knew what form the Greywaren took, but alas, it wouldn’t be fun if it was easy. (Actually, it might.)

 

He begins by going over what he knows about the Lynch family. He knows Niall Lynch procured magical items from something he called the Greywaren and he knows he had Niall Lynch killed. The wife died soon after Niall. Out of their three sons, only one is of interest: Declan Lynch. Declan Lynch is very private. He followed his father’s footsteps, though with significantly less pomp. Declan Lynch doesn’t know what the Greywaren is. Allegedly.

 

Ronan and Matthew Lynch appear to be exactly zero percent involved with Declan’s dealings. Colin wonders if they have any idea how their family became so rich; it seems likely. But Declan seems to have gone to great measures to protect his younger brothers. This could be a result of familial love. It also could be something else.

 

After some more thorough and less legal research, he finds that Matthew Lynch is about as harmful as a mouse. Ronan Lynch, however, is more interesting. Since his father’s death, he became involved with some unsavory people and did some unsavory things. He’s a high school dropout with an affinity for drag racing and has been consistently and relentlessly hidden from the more unpleasant corners of the world by his older brother, which grants him the title of, sorry Declan, Most Interesting Lynch Spawn.

 

If Colin had more people at his disposal, he could have Ronan Lynch’s criminal record in his hands within the hour. He could figure out the kind of people Ronan Lynch hangs around with and where those people live, maybe pay them a visit. He could find someone to make disappear to draw Ronan out of hiding. 

 

Another man of note in Henrietta is the Gray Man. He had been Colin’s favourite lackey; losing him wasn’t easy, but it was soon overshadowed by Piper’s not-death. The Gray Man settled down with some woman in some house. The woman’s name is Maura Sargent, and she has a daughter named Blue and two friends named Persephone and Calla. Colin thinks those are beautiful names. He also thinks he should have done something nasty to them so the Gray Man wouldn’t run away from him. He could still do that, of course, but it would be in bad taste. He files it away in his mind as a last resort.

 

Having Ronan Lynch as some semblance of a goal feels nice. It feels good to have something to search for after so long. The years between now and Piper not-dying were dark and pathetic and filled with too much Netflix and Chinese takeout. Colin Greenmantle, who has two PhDs and stunning good looks, went weeks at a time without leaving his lush apartment. It’s embarrassing, really. Maybe his fervish search for the Greywaren is just another manifestation of that sadness; it’s proven time and time again to be impossible to find, but he’s confident this time around. He has a plan.

 

First, he gets a wad of cash and buys an assortment of burner phones. Second, he calls some old friends who owe him favours. Third, he writes down the phone number and address of one Joseph Kavinsky.

 

♕

  


Due to the nature of his career, Colin has met countless people he’d like nothing more than to never see again. After not two minutes of something that Colin hesitates to call a conversation, Joseph Kavinsky is near the top of that list. Honestly, it’s hard to believe he’s a real human being. Currently, he’s sucking obscenely on a sucker in a way that is surely engineered to make other people uncomfortable. They’re seated in a diner that’s only a step up from an actual pigsty, talking over greasy burgers that could give them radioactive poisoning.

 

Kavinsky removes the sucker from his mouth with a disgusting pop. “You want me to bring Lynch to you?”

 

“Yes.” That is what he’s been saying for the past few minutes, after all. At first, Colin thought Kavinsky was exceedingly stupid, but then he noticed the kid’s dilated pupils. Also, the stupidity could be an act. You can never be too careful, after all. 

 

He wishes he could find literally anyone else to help him, but there’s no one he trusts to kidnap Lynch as neatly as he’d like, and the boy seems to have no friends. That leaves Kavinsky, or marching straight into Lynch’s house, guns blazing. 

 

Kavinsky considers this for a moment, toying with the french fries on his plate. “Why do you want him, sweetheart?”

 

Colin suppresses a grimace at the pet name. “I’m looking for something, and he can help me.”

 

“And why do you need _my_ help?” 

 

Colin gets the feeling Kavinsky knows the answers to the questions he’s asking already. This is why he prefers to stay behind the scenes. “You know how to get to him.”

 

“I do,” he says gleefully, “and I don’t want to help you.”

 

Maybe this was a mistake. Clearly Kavinsky cares about Ronan Lynch in some fucked up capacity. “This isn’t a suggestion.” He clicks the safety off of the gun he’s holding under the table. He won’t use it unless things get dire– shooting people was more Piper’s thing, unfortunately.

 

Kavinsky leans in so he’s uncomfortably close to Colin’s face. Colin can smell the sugar-sweet scent of candy, along with something else sharp and alcoholic on his breath. “You’re not going to use that thing if you’re desperate enough to come beg at my feet.” He puts the sucker back in his mouth and leans back. He kicks his feet up on the table and drums his bony fingers on the splintering wood as he waits for an answer 

 

“How about this,” Colin says coolly, “I’ll deliver him straight back to your doorstep when I’m done with him. I won’t kill you or anyone you care about.” That’s about as much as he can offer, because Kavinsky reeks of new money and a disregard for his life. 

 

“You’ll never be done with him,” Kavinsky sneers. “Unless you want him as like, a personal sex slave, because he takes a while to put out.” He makes a lewd gesture with his sucker.

 

“Let’s take a walk,” Colin suggests.

 

They do not, in fact, take a walk. Colin leaves some bills on the table because while he’s a criminal and has had many people killed, he’s not _rude_. Then, once they emerge from the shithole diner, Colin drags Kavinsky into the alley beside the building, shoves him against the brick wall, and puts the gun against his stomach. 

 

“Golly, this is pretty kinky for a first date, even for me,” Kavinsky lisps around his sucker. “Is that a gun, or are you just happy to see me?” He then proceeds to spit his sucker at Colin’s face, who can’t even remove it without letting go of Kavinsky. It slides agonizingly slowly down his cheek. 

 

“You can either do what I say,” Colin says coolly, “or die.” He really, really doesn’t want to do this. Sure, he’s had the Gray Man kill a great number of people, but having real, red blood on his actual hands is just not fun. It’s not something he’s interested in doing.

 

Luckily, Kavinsky surprises him by answering, “Pick him up on Friday at eight. Text me if you want details.” Colin lets him down. Kavinsky plucks the sucker, which has slid down to his neck, off of Colin and pops it back in his mouth. 

 

When he gets back into his car, he realizes he could have done it differently; he could have found all the leads possible on Ronan Lynch, could have observed him until he knew his daily routine and then plucked him out of the local supermarket. But Colin’s impatient, and besides, it seems rude to steal Mr. Gray’s style. Still, it might have been worth it to avoid Joseph Kavinsky.

 

He has five entire days to kill while he waits for whatever the fuck is happening on Friday. He supposes he could get started on the Piper situation, though he’s not sure what the Piper situation is, exactly. He’d made sure no one knew he was coming here, especially not her, though that particular cat may be out of the bag by now. 

 

The thing about Piper was that Colin never loved her _that_ much. He’s a man of self-interest first and foremost. He loved her, sure; they were married, after all. He loved impressing her with trinkets she couldn’t find anywhere else. She was his perfect match; vain and beautiful and not easily amazed. Despite this, she was messy and ambitious, two characteristics that weren’t conducive to subtlety, which was something that Colin relied on greatly in his business endeavors. Then, she died, or so he thought, and he was left with no one to show off to and no one to love but himself, but he’d become something less than loveable without Piper to impress.

 

He’s back now, though, or he will be, once he finds Ronan Lynch.

 

He considers the possibility that Ronan Lynch will give him nothing. He could be completely in the dark on the whole situation. He could also refuse to give up any information. He will, of course, but Colin really doesn’t want to use his gun again so soon. 

 

Maybe Kavinsky won’t keep his word. This would be unfavourable because then he’d have wasted a week doing nothing _and_ he would have to find Ronan Lynch another way. On the other hand, he’d never have to speak to the human stain of Joseph Kavinsky again.

 

There’s only so long Colin can tear himself apart over what might happen when he meets Niall Lynch’s teenaged son, which leaves him with the Piper Situation.

 

He resolves to find out what she’s doing with the ley line. He has some idea, of course; there are niche groups of people who’ve dedicated their pathetic lives to learning about ley lines, a pastime Colin would normally write off as worthless, but has been quite useful with the Piper Situation. As the week goes by, he makes some phone calls and pays visits to some rich scholars’ homes. None of them are quite as informed or as detailed as the Harvard kid’s leather book, but Colin’s not greedy.

 

He’s pretty sure Piper is doing some kind of ritual to either destroy the ley line or take its power for herself. The latter seems more likely, but the _how_ is what’s stumping him. Colin’s well-versed in magical artefacts, but magic itself isn’t something that’s ever interested him. He’s a fucking collector, not a magician. He remembers there being some psychic back at Harvard. He’d considered paying him a visit too, but then decided against it after the disaster with the Gansey kid. Now, though, he’s regretting it. 

 

Eventually, he strikes gold; he flips through the worn leather notebook again and searches for the mentions of _Malory_. After some research, Colin finds that _Malory_ refers to Roger Malory, a frighteningly old English man who is something of an expert on ley lines. He uses his second last burner phone to telephone him.

 

Their conversation is long and terribly boring. Malory has an ability to go off on tangents that Colin has heretofore never encountered. Still, it grants him some insight; taking the power of a ley line takes an intricate ritual, rife with blood and sacrifice, which is right up Piper’s alley. 

 

One thing struck Colin as odd, though. After no small amount of wheedling on Colin’s part, Malory had confessed that a sacrifice to a ley line couldn’t be something simple. For example, you can’t kill someone for the sacrifice if it’s not your first kill, or killing means nothing to you. So what’s Piper sacrificing? She doesn’t care about anything, at least she didn’t when they were married. Except for Colin, but even that’s doubtful, considering she faked her death to escape him. He laughs bitterly.

 

He decides he needs to get out of the house. It’s Thursday, just one day before Kavinsky delivers Ronan Lynch, and he can feel himself slipping back into dangerous post-Piper habits. Google tells him there’s a nice restaurant on the main drag, the kind with bare lightbulbs hanging from high ceilings and above-average prices for below-average food. He phones to make a reservation, and the man on the other end of the phone sounds surprised anyone cares enough to make a reservation. 

 

With a sigh, he makes one last phone call. It rings, rings, rings for so long Colin thinks hopefully that the recipient won’t pick up. Unfortunately, he does. “Hey, asshole,” Kavinsky says. His sleazy voice makes Colin feel like he needs a shower.

 

“Where?” Is all he asks.

 

“The abandoned church. Don’t be late!” 

 

♕

 

Colin is exactly on time for his reservation at a restaurant whose name he honestly cannot remember. He’s been to a hundred others just like it. He hasn’t even ordered when someone sits down across from him. It takes him a second too long to recognize his wife; her hair is shorter and she looks much older. She wears a pink sundress that looks entirely out of character on her. Her makeup is thick and overdone, and even then it barely hides the creases lining her face. It all makes a grotesquely pretty picture. A caricature of a woman sits before him.

 

“Don’t you recognize me?” Piper asks, smiling sweetly. 

 

“How could I forget you?” He replies in a similarly sugary tone. She grins.

 

“What are you doing in Henrietta, _honey_?”

 

They do not address Piper’s faking her death because that would be uncouth, but Colin would really, really like to. “I thought I’d take a vacation.”

 

“You’ve been vacationing for a few years now, haven’t you?” She taps her lacquered nails on the metal table. “I’ll spare you the embarrassment of confessing you galavanted across the country in a heroic quest to get me back. I’m here to tell you that I’d like you to stop stirring up whatever it is you’re trying to stir up. I’m a little busy.”

 

“That’s nice,” Colin replies, “but I’m afraid I can’t.”

 

“It’s not a suggestion, sweetheart,” she says calmly, and wow, he’d forgotten what it felt like to be at the business end of these sort of things. Why did he come out here again? Sitting around in his beautiful rented house watching Netflix sounds awfully nice right now.

 

“Too bad,” he says. “I don’t plan on leaving, but I’m sure you’ll be the first to know if I do.” Talking to your possibly-ex-wife is awkward, apparently. Colin Greenmantle doesn’t deal in awkwardness; he’s suave and cool. Except around quasi-exes, apparently. 

 

Piper toys with her hair. “I’ve missed you, husband. I’d love to have dinner with you, but I have business to attend to. I hope I won’t catch you later!”

 

Before she can stand up, Colin grabs her wrist. “Tell me what you’re doing.”

 

“No.” Piper removes herself from Colin’s grip. “But I know something about the Greywaren you don’t.” Then, she leaves, pushing the tiny metal chair out with a loud clatter. Colin can’t do more than stare after her. It’s difficult to think rationally. Her pink sundress swings attractively as she walks away. She knows something about the Greywaren? And she won’t _tell him_? It’s. Preposterous. Horrible. His worst nightmare. Piper might just top Kavinsky on Colin’s Least Favourite People list.

 

“Will you need two menus?” A waitress, who appeared at some point Colin honestly cannot recall, asks.

 

“Actually,” Colin replies, “I have to go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Up next:
> 
> _“Hey, Lynch,” Kavinsky says, waving an exact copy of Ronan’s key fob. “I’m afraid you’re stuck.”_


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very sorry that this is a day late, yesterday was very busy.

It’s Friday afternoon, and Ronan couldn’t be happier that Adam’s still too tired to do anything more than lay in bed. If he doesn’t decide to do something stupid like go into town, Kavinsky can’t take him.

 

Ronan has been hesitant to leave Adam’s side while he recovers from Cabeswater’s attempted murder (Adam doesn’t like it when Ronan calls it that, but when has Ronan been known to sugarcoat shit?). Adam can barely walk, but Ronan knows with one hundred percent certainty that if he were left on his own, Adam would pull some idiotic stunt like try to help with the farm work. It’s taking Adam longer to snap out of it than Ronan did, which terrifies Ronan to no end. Adam, of course, insists he’s fine. 

 

Suddenly, someone knocks on the door. Adam jolts in Ronan’s arms. “Come in!” Ronan calls out.

 

Gansey pokes his head inside. “We’re having lunch-slash-dinner.” He actually says _slash_ out loud. “You should join us.” Ronan knows that Gansey’s use of _should_ is code for _Declan told me to get you but I don’t want to be rude about it_. He hopes that Henrietta’s magic coterie hasn’t once again gathered at the Barns without Ronan’s permission. 

 

“Be there in a minute.” Ronan starts to get up, gingerly untangling himself from Adam’s octopus grip. 

 

“Lemme come with you,” Adam mumbles, lifting his head from the pillow. It looks to take a great amount of effort. 

 

“No, you’re staying here,” Ronan says. 

 

“I’ll try to walk downstairs by myself,” Adam threatens, pulling himself into a sitting position. He almost falls back down because of a sheet slipping under his palm, which would be funny in almost any other situation. 

 

“You better fucking not,” Ronan hisses, narrowing his eyes. “You’ll never get better if you wear yourself out.”

 

“If I didn’t know any better I’d think this was all a ruse to keep me in your bed.” Ronan doesn’t bother to point out that it’ Adam’s bed too. 

 

Adam holds his arms out to Ronan. Ronan rolls his eyes and helps him off the bed and into a standing position. Adam starts to hobble toward the door, but Ronan holds him back. “I’d love it if you went down their shirtless, but you might be cold, genius,” he says drily, guiding Adam to the closet. After Adam finds one of Ronan’s sweaters and they make the long, perilous trek downstairs, Adam all but collapses at the table. Cheng’s busy making some kind of hopefully edible food in the kitchen and Gansey’s absorbed in a book, hunching over the table as he pores over the dreadfully boring-looking pages. Declan and Matthew, who are still here for some reason, look at Adam and Ronan expectantly.

 

“Are you feeling better, Adam?” Matthew asks with too much excitement for this time of day. Actually, Ronan’s not sure what time it is.

 

Adam shrugs. “Same as yesterday.” It’s not hard to see that. The back of the chair is the only thing holding him up. Ronan itches to drag his chair right beside Adam’s just to support him, but Adam would push him away.

 

“What is this?” Ronan asks, raising an eyebrow at Declan. “Are you staging an intervention?”

 

Declan sighs. “Can’t I have lunch with my brother?” 

 

“We’re in my house. Cheng is making us lunch. Maybe you’re trying to corner me because you know I won’t leave Parrish alone and he can’t run away from you.”

 

“I resent that,” Adam snaps, smacking Ronan’s arm too lightly for it to do any real harm. Before he can move away, Ronan takes his hand and laces their fingers together.

 

“I know you won’t leave, but have you considered getting out of here just for today?” Declan asks. “It’s embarrassingly obvious how worried you are.”

 

In all honesty, that sounds like an amazing idea, but it’s a little too good to be true. “Maybe if Parrish could sit up on his own.”

 

“Fuck you, Lynch.”

 

“Maybe once you’re awake.”

 

“Even just to Sargent’s place?” Declan presses, hastily and obviously cutting off Ronan and Adam’s tangent. “It’s not a good idea for you to stay, if you really think Kavinsky would come here.” It’s gratifying to have Declan listen for once, but there’s one problem: Adam’s pigheaded idiocy.

 

On cue, Adam sighs and says, “Kavinsky’s not going to come anywhere near us.” They’ve had this argument several times over the course of the week, and it always ends the same way.

 

“You don’t know what he’s capable of, Parrish.” Ronan grips Adam’s hand harder. “I think I’m the expert here.”

 

Adam scowls. He doesn’t like being reminded of Ronan’s past with Kavinsky, either out of dislike for Kavinsky as a person or out of jealousy, possibly both. “I just think you’re making a fuss over nothing.” His exhaustion melts the consonants off the ends of his words: _I just think you’re makin’ a fuss over nothin’_. Ronan wants to kiss him and also kidnap him to some sequestered corner of the Earth where Kavinsky and Greenmantle could never touch them again.

 

“Somehow, I think Ronan’s right,” Declan interrupts. The words sound like they hurt on the way out, but Ronan couldn’t care less.

 

“You hear that, Parrish?” He doesn’t try to keep the smugness from his voice.

 

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” He sits up straighter. “Didn’t take y’all for cowards, but I’ll go if you really want.” This second part is directed at Ronan. Ronan gives him a look that says _thank you_. Adam returns it with an expression that reads _this isn’t over_. 

 

“Pancakes, gentlemen,” Cheng cuts in, placing a towering stack on the table. Matthew’s face lights up. Even Gansey looks up from his book and grins. Ronan takes one from the top of the pile with his hands and stuffs it in his mouth, just because he can. Adam leans forward and kisses the syrup from his lips. “Disgusting,” Cheng comments with a perverse sort of glee. 

 

A stack of plates appears on the table and everyone serves themselves, and it’s nice, if you ignore the shadow of Kavinsky hanging over them (actually, Ronan seems to be the only one worrying about this, which is worrying in itself). It would have been nicer without Declan, but even he’s not being particularly irritating today.

 

“Jane says Maura and the others think that if Cabeswater goes off again, it won’t come back on,” Gansey says between bites. “I agree with them. It’s incredible that it’s–”

 

“Jane?” Adam asks, eyebrows raised incredulously. “Are you talking about Blue?”

 

Gansey’s face turns beet red. “Yes. Anyway, the Henrietta ley line, despite being awake, is fractured, so I’m not surprised that–”

 

Cheng rolls his eyes. “Your subtlety is astounding.”

 

“She just let you _rename her_?” Adam sounds very awake now. “Is she okay?”

 

“Yes, and yes.” He buries his face in his hands. “We really should talk about Cabeswater, you know, it’s important.”

 

Ronan eyes Gansey suspiciously as they continue to badger him about his desecration of Blue’s entire personality. If Gansey and Cheng weren’t dating, he’d think Gansey liked Blue. However, Gansey and Cheng are dating, so Ronan doesn’t know what Gansey’s plan is. He doesn’t know either of them well enough to assume anything, but the behaviour strikes him as suspicious. 

 

When Ronan zones back in, Gansey looks properly chastised and Cheng looks smug. Matthew’s still ravenously devouring his pancakes, which are admittedly excellent, though Ronan would never voice that opinion within twenty miles of Cheng and his inflated ego. Adam looks mostly asleep, which Ronan knows is because he’s too tired to ask Ronan to help him back upstairs where he can rest. Wordlessly, he stands up and hoists Adam over his shoulder. “Fuck you, Lynch, I can walk,” Adam says, but his face is pressed into Ronan’s shirt so it comes out muffled and not at all threatening.

 

In a truly astonishing manoeuvre, Ronan lies down on the couch and pulls Adam directly on top of him. “Baby,” Adam mumbles into Ronan’s collarbone, “I thought we were leaving,” and _oh_ , Ronan loves it when Adam’s tired enough to call him _sweetheart, baby, sugar_ , loves it because of how rare it is for Adam to be so open and loves it because of how those words on Adam’s lips taste in his mouth. Ronan kisses the top of his head because Adam’s mouth is not currently accessible to him.

 

“Sleep for a bit first,” Ronan says, but Adam’s eyes are already shut. 

 

Ronan listens to the others bustle around the dining room; Matthew, gushing over Cheng’s cooking and Gansey insisting on helping clean up. Cheng starts a rambling story about some busker he met in Brazil that has Matthew enthralled. Though Cheng and Gansey have grown on Ronan in their stay at the Barns, Matthew taking an instant liking to them is what seals the deal.

 

Declan stays silent the whole time, because he hates fun. Ronan’s pretty sure the only reason he’s still here is for Matthew. Matthew insisted on staying at the Barns for a few more days in case anything happened, and also because he’s deeply concerned about Adam. “I don’t _want_ to miss school, but I really think we should stay here!” He cried when Declan pointed out they had to go home. No one believed him, of course, but Declan’s only weakness is Matthew Lynch.

 

Ronan’s getting tired of having Declan around. He’s tired of fighting. Scratch that, he’s tired of Declan creating reasons for them to argue, and he’s tired of the taste Declan leaves in his mouth, like gasoline and blood and hangovers. More than that, the looks Declan gives him whenever he so much as glances at Adam _hurt_ . Adam is the best part of Ronan’s life. The family they’ve built with Opal is maybe the only thing Ronan can say he’s truly proud of, but Declan brushes it off. Ronan wants to be good enough, he _is_ good enough, but Declan doesn’t care enough to see that.

 

♕

  
Ronan and Adam are woken up by Matthew shouting gleefully after winning a game of Catan against Cheng, Gansey, and Opal. Ronan decides it’s time to leave; anxiety is eating him alive. He locks up the Barns and helps Adam to the BMW while Cheng and Gansey help Matthew and Declan pack their bags into the Volvo. 

 

“Bye, Ronan,” Matthew says, hugging his older brother. “I hope you’ll be okay.”

 

“You too.”

 

“Let me know if anything else happens.” Declan’s permanent glare doesn’t lift as he stares at Ronan, waiting for a reply. Ronan just shrugs. 

 

“It was nice to meet you!” Matthew cries to Cheng and Gansey, giving each of them a hug. If Declan weren’t here, Ronan might smile at his little brother’s boundless charm. “Bye, Adam! Feel better!”

  
Once Declan pulls out of the driveway, Ronan starts the car. Cheng and Gansey are oddly silent with Opal between them, so he growls, “What.”

 

“Your older brother is certainly interesting,” Cheng says mildly. Ronan snorts, but doesn’t comment. 

 

“He seemed worried about you, at least?” Gansey doesn’t sound sure of this. Ronan feels the same way.

 

“If Declan were capable of emotion, maybe he would have been,” Ronan says, gripping the steering wheel tighter. Adam hums in agreement. Cheng and Gansey drop it, thankfully. He doesn’t like thinking about Declan any more than is strictly necessary, because it kindles the kind of fire in his stomach that burns bridges and licks up Ronan’s self-control.

 

Suddenly, there is a noise like something shattering, and the BMW veers off to the side of the road, completely out of Ronan’s control. Opal lets out a birdlike screech. It careens into the forest, but the trees are small and sparse here and the car has slowed down considerably when its side grazes a pine tree. There’s a cacophony of grating noises: headlights shattering, the mirror snapping off, windows breaking, bark screeching against the metal. Then, silence. 

 

Ronan takes a deep breath, but before he can examine the damage, there’s a click. It’s familiar, of course; just the sound of the car doors locking. Except, Ronan didn’t do that, and now he can’t unlock them. Kavinsky’s white Mitsubishi parks on the side of the road. Kavinsky emerges from it, followed by Prokopenko and Skov.

 

“Hey, Lynch,” Kavinsky says, waving an exact copy of Ronan’s key fob. “I’m afraid you’re stuck.”

 

Ronan considers punching the rest of the glass out of his window, but he wouldn’t be able to fit through it. He glances anxiously at Adam, who appears to be wide awake now. “What the fuck do you want.” His voice stays flat; he doesn’t want to play Kavinsky’s games.

 

“Just Parrish, don’t worry.” Kavinsky nods at Prokopenko, who starts walking around to the passenger side of the car. Opal whimpers. Kavinsky opens Ronan’s door and grabs him by the collar of his shirt, pulling him out of the car. Ronan knees him in the groin and tries to twist around to get a view of Adam, but Kavinsky just winches and doesn’t let go. Ronan tries to shove him away, but Kavinsky uses his free hand to pull Ronan forward by his belt loops. Skov grabs Ronan’s hands and hold them behind his back. 

 

Ronan tries to kick Kavinsky again, but he locks his ankle around Ronan’s so Ronan’s thigh is trapped between his. “You like that?” Kavinsky’s breath tastes like death in Ronan’s mouth.

 

Opal screeches, but the click sounds again, which Ronan takes to mean all the doors are once again locked. That, of course, means Prokopenko has taken Adam. There’s a hissing sound that Ronan can’t place. Kavinsky looks away for a moment, then back at Ronan. “You didn’t tell me you already drugged him. How considerate, darling.” With all his might, Ronan knocks his forehead into Kavinsky’s. It hurts like a bitch, but it’s enough for him to stumble back. Ronan rips his hands out of Skov’s grip and makes a break for where Prokopenko is dragging Adam away, but Skov grabs him around the waist and throws him to the ground. He plants his foot on Ronan’s chest. Kavinsky appears in Ronan’s line of sight and kicks him in the head. He hears the sickening thud before he blacks out. 

  
  
  
  


 

He comes to not thirty seconds later, but Kavinsky’s already driving away. Groggily, Ronan pulls himself into a sitting position. Cheng, Gansey, and Opal are all dead asleep in the back seat of the BMW. That explains the hissing noise.

 

If the BMW was working, Ronan could catch Kavinsky no problem, but Ronan’s fucking magic dream car is broken and Adam’s moving farther and farther away from him with every passing second. 

 

He takes a moment to scream, “ _FUCK_ ,” into the empty forest before trying the back door closest to him. It doesn’t open, because of course, so he gets back into the driver’s seat. Luckily, that door had been carelessly left open. He pushes the passenger seat as far forward as it can go so he can reach into the backseat to unbuckle Opal’s seatbelt and pulls her sleeping body into his arms. 

 

Ronan clutches Opal close. Before he knows it, tears are falling, hot and fast. Sobs wrack his body. He _failed,_ in every conceivable way. Kavinsky fucking took Adam and drugged Opal, Gansey, and Cheng. He stole Adam from under Ronan’s nose. Ronan could have fought harder, or checked the car before they left, or done _anything_. Instead, he took Kavinsky’s abuse and watched while they took Adam’s basically unconscious body to who fucking knows where.

 

Once he decides he’s cried enough, he gently lies Opal down on the ground, far away from the crash site for fear of stray broken glass and close to Adam’s shattered phone, and crawls back into the car. He awkwardly leans into the back seat and grabs Gansey’s phone from where it’s lying in his lap, because he left his own at home.

 

He gets out of the car and goes back to Opal. He leans against a tree and holds her in his lap like a lifeline. Gansey’s phone is already unlocked and open on the phone app, like he was going to call for help before the gas took effect. Ronan’s glad Gansey already has Fox Way in his contacts because he’s shit at remembering phone numbers. (Except for Adam’s, and fucking Kavinsky’s. Fuck.)

 

As soon as the other line picks up, Orla shouts, “BLUE, YOUR BOYFRIEND’S ON THE PHONE! AGAIN!” 

 

Ronan snaps, “Fuck off. Tell her it’s me.”

 

Orla replies, “You aren’t Blue’s BF.”

 

He sighs. “Get the maggot on the phone _now,_ I swear to God.” Fortunately, Orla is psychic and realizes something is terribly, horribly wrong and shouts even louder for her cousin.

 

Blue sounds out of breath when she answers. “Why are you on Gansey’s phone?”

 

“Because I left mine at home, and Gansey didn’t mind because he’s fucking unconscious.” Embarrassingly, Ronan lets out a sob. “Kavinsky,” he says by way of an explanation.

 

Blue exhales heavily. “What happened?”

 

“He fucking… took Adam. And he put some gas in my car so Cheng, Gansey, and Opal are all knocked out.” He pauses to get his breathing under control so he doesn’t do anything gross like start crying again. “Can you come get us?” He gives Blue his location and hangs up.

 

After what felt like hours but couldn’t have been more than five minutes, Ronan hears a noise from the car. Cheng’s banging on the window, looking murderous. Ronan stands up with great effort, taking Opal with him, and walks back to the car. “You have to climb out through the driver’s seat,” he explains. Opal yawns, but goes back to sleep. Ronan’s thankful for that; he’s not sure he could survive explaining where Adam went.

 

“Sargent’s on her way,” he says once Cheng clambers out of the car. He keeps looking back at Gansey worriedly, which is positively irritating. “At least he’s fucking _here_ ,” Ronan spits venomously, and doesn’t regret it one bit. If Adam were here, he’d chastise him, but Ronan’s in luck.

 

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” Cheng replies kindly. “When did she leave?”

 

Ronan shrugs. “I called five minutes ago. She drives like a fucking snail, though.” Ronan thinks she might stop obeying speed limits so religiously today. He hopes.

 

Eventually, Gansey wakes up and joins them. Opal’s shifting in Ronan’s arms, so he knows she’s no longer under the influence of whatever the fuck Kavinsky put in the car, but she’s still asleep. Ronan tosses Gansey’s phone back to its rightful owner and lets Cheng explain what happened.

 

Just when Ronan’s starting to worry about Opal, she blinks awake. “Where’s Adam?” Her wide eyes are wet and her small hands trembling.

 

“He’s gone,” Ronan replies after a long moment. “Kavinsky took him.” She lets out an animalistic keen before burying her head in Ronan’s chest. He pushes his head in her hair and pretends he’s not crying. 

 

Ten minutes later, Blue pulls up. Or rather, Jimi pulls up and Blue leaps out of the passenger seat, which explains why they arrived so fast. There’s some fuss about everyone fitting in the back seat, but Ronan probably would have kept Opal in his arms had there been space anyway. Blue and Jimi ask him questions, but Ronan doesn’t really hear.

 

If they were going back to the Barns, Ronan would spend the night getting acquainted with his father’s finest vodka. Unfortunately, he has to save his breakdown for when Adam’s home safe, so he just bites down on his fist and doesn’t say anything when Opal gets snot all over his shirt. 

 

When they pull into the driveway of 300 Fox Way, it takes Ronan a few seconds to notice. It’s long enough that Jimi starts looking at him pitifully once she’s out of the car, which. “Fuck off,” he snarls, throwing the door open. Jimi sighs heavily but doesn’t comment. Ronan kind of wishes she had, so he’d have someone to yell at.

 

It feels sort of like a dream, or maybe a nightmare when they cross the threshold of the house. The sort of fear that usually lays latent during his waking hours is creeping into his thoughts, lacing them with paranoia. There’s a parasitic feeling crawling up Ronan’s throat, something raw and loathsome and terrifying. He knows with complete certainty it’ll kill him if he lets it. He keeps expecting a man-shaped raven to jump out at him from around the corner, because in what other reality would he let Adam get taken by Kavinsky?

 

Jimi takes Opal from him. Opal fights against her, but it’s for the best; Ronan was probably halfway to crushing her, anyway. He throws himself on the couch and brings his wrist to his mouth so he can chew on his leather bracelets instead of something stupid like start sobbing or scream at the next person to try to talk to him. 

 

Blue sits beside him, far enough away that they aren’t touching. He kind of wants to hug her, but he can’t just _ask_. Her eyes are ringed with red, and Ronan’s sure his match. She sniffs before asking, “Where do you think Kavinsky took him?” 

 

Maybe he should have seen the panic attack coming; the circumstances certainly warranted one. Still, Ronan’s momentarily convinced he’s going to die when his breathing gets short. It’s just, he doesn’t _know_ where Kavinsky could have taken Adam. It could be the abandoned fairground where he held all of his substance parties, or the backroads past the old gas station where they used to fuck around, or halfway across the fucking world. He doesn’t _know_ but he has to know because they’re all relying on him to figure it out or Adam’s going to die, Adam’s going to die and it will be Ronan’s fault. Kavinsky could be doing anything to Adam, and Adam can’t even fight back because Ronan couldn’t fix Cabeswater. Ronan might find Adam with his brains spilling out onto the asphalt—

 

“Ronan, you have to breathe, okay?” Blue’s arms are around him, prying his hands from his face. “Come on, I know you can.” It takes a moment for Ronan to register Blue as _not a threat_ so he nearly pushes her off. Once it registers that she’s trying to comfort him, though, he lets out a sob. It hurts his chest and doesn’t help his jackhammering heartbeat, but he can’t stop. Blue’s crawls basically on top of him, breathing deeply. Ronan knows he’s supposed to try and copy her inhales and exhales to calm down, but right now stilling his heaving chest is impossible, so he just lets her rhythmic breathing lull him for a few minutes. He wraps his arms around her until he’s got nothing left. 

 

“Thanks for ruining my shirt,” Blue whispers without letting go of Ronan, which he appreciates.

 

“It was already ugly, maggot.” By silent mutual agreement, they both pretend his voice doesn’t tremble. 

 

Eventually, Blue gets up and they have to face the grim reality of their situation: Adam’s gone, and they don’t know where he is. At some point, Gansey and Cheng as well as Jimi, Persephone, and Opal crowded into the living room. Opal wastes no time making herself at home in Ronan’s lap. He wonders where Calla and Maura are, but quickly decides he doesn’t give a shit. 

 

“Ronan…” Blue says hesitantly, coaxing him into contributing while trying to prevent the onset of another panic attack.

 

Ronan nods. He tries to remember Kavinsky’s old haunts and hopes to God that’s where he took Adam. “He could be at the fairgrounds, or out by the old gas station. There’s this place way out of town he keeps all his old Evos, and…” He’s not sure. There are a hundred other places he frequented when he was one of Kavinsky’s pack of dogs, a hundred other places stained by memories that are blotted out by pills and powder. Right now, though, it’s all too fuzzy. There’s something Ronan’s missing, some memory that’s slipping through his fingers.

 

Persephone says, “The answers you seek lie beyond your reach, but behind ours.”

 

The pieces click into place.

  


♕

 

_Ronan went to sleep with a frenetic ball of anger building in his chest, bouncing around and making him sick. This tempestuous lump of emotion manifests itself in Ronan’s favourite and most irritating way: Adam._

 

_Usually, when Ronan dreams of Adam, it ends with a great deal of heavy petting and sexual frustration. Ronan will wake up and jerk off silently while hating himself just a little bit more. He knows he shouldn’t be beating off to thoughts of his heterosexual best friend, okay, but it’s the most he’ll ever get._

 

_This Adam, though, isn’t like Ronan’s usual dream-Adams. This Adam looks like Adam, instead of his dream forest’s impression of him. He’s not the caricature Ronan’s used to._

 

_“The fuck are you doing here?” He asks. Adam doesn’t seem to hear him, which is normal, so he repeats himself. Adam still doesn’t react. Instead, he stares at something that isn’t there. Or, Ronan thinks there’s nothing there; he follows Adam’s gaze to a woman who definitely hadn’t been there just seconds ago. Adam looks to be talking to her, but no sound comes from his mouth. His eyes flick down, for just half a second, which is enough to point Ronan to the knife in the woman’s hand. Ronan also notices some creepy shit on the ground behind Adam: strange occult symbols carved into the dirt and a bowl full of dark liquid. This, paired with the knife, makes Ronan think something very, very bad is about to happen._

 

_It occurs to Ronan that this is not a regular dream, or maybe not a dream at all. Random bits of information previously stuffed into crevices of Ronan’s mind he’d rather not think about arrange themselves into a photograph: Cabeswater, intimately familiar to Ronan for reasons he’d refused to admit to himself before now, and Adam, surrounded by Ronan’s trees with a knife at his throat._

 

_Ronan wakes up and searches for his keys._

 

♕

 

Persephone gives him a knowing look. “You already knew how.” She taps her temple. Ronan nods.

 

“I’m going to sleep,” he announces without preamble. “I’ll wake up when I figure out where he is.”

  
  
  
  


 

It takes a few moments for him to gather his bearings; he’s in Cabeswater, which can’t be right. Kavinsky can’t have taken Adam to Cabeswater. Cabeswater, he realizes, is flickering in and out of existence. Ronan fears if he moves too suddenly it’ll disappear forever, like a candle going out in a gust of wind. 

 

“I need you to take me to Adam,” he calls out. When Cabeswater doesn’t respond, he shouts, “If you want your precious Magician to live, you have to tell me where he is!”

 

There’s a rush of vertigo and a feeling of exhaustion so deep Ronan thinks he might die, but it only lasts a moment. He blinks, and he’s no longer in Cabeswater. Or, Cabeswater has transformed. This new place looks oddly familiar, though he can’t place it. There’s a dilapidated old building a few feet away from him that he takes a few seconds to place as a church, which.

 

Ronan knows where he is.

 

It’s the old abandoned church Blue showed them, the one she visits every St. Mark’s Eve. Kavinsky’s Mitsubishi is parked in the churchyard trailed by tire tracks tarnishing the once-holy ground. There’s another car there too, one Ronan doesn’t recognize. He shivers.

 

There’s no door to the church, so it’s easy to get in. Immediately, Ronan spots Adam: he’s dead asleep, tied up and lying on the altar like some fucked-up modern art installation. Kavinsky’s locked in an argument with a man Ronan’s brain immediately calls _handsome_ , with his bright blue eyes and—

 

Oh.

 

Apart from what Greenmantle’s presence means for him, it makes Ronan angry to think that Greenmantle thought the best way to get to him was through Kavinsky. It makes him angrier that Kavinsky knew, _knows_ , that the best way to Ronan is Adam. 

 

He starts to try and wake up, but the church disappears. For a fraction of a second, there’s nothing around him but stark emptiness, but Cabeswater reappears. Ronan doesn’t think it’ll come back next time, but before he can try to snap himself out of this dream, he feels a great heaving in his chest.

 

He can’t wake up.

 

Before Cabeswater can succumb to whatever it is Piper’s doing, he grabs a piece of paper and a pen, because he’s in a dream and he can manifest whatever the fuck he wants. He scribbles something on the sheet and clutches in his fist, running his fingers all the crinkles and creases. If Cabeswater is going to go out while he’s stuck here, he _has_ to will this sheet of paper into reality. He pours his desperation into the air, commanding Cabeswater will use the last reserves of its power to do this for him. He can feel it bending to his will and he can feel it running out.

 

At last, the paper disappears from his hand, but he’s distracted. It’s an odd feeling, to have the very reality you’re currently existing in falling away around you. Is this what dying is like? Surely not, because Ronan’s still aware, he can still feel the slowly growing nothingness around him.

 

Cabeswater doesn’t disappear, and it does. Ronan doesn’t exist, and he does.

 

♕

 

“What the hell?” Blue asks. Ronan just… went to sleep, right there. Opal’s still sitting in his lap. She pinches his cheek with concern, but Ronan doesn’t react. Blue turns to Persephone. “What do you mean, he already knew?” Persephone just shrugs.

 

No one’s sure what to say. Blue had been anticipating a frantic search around Henrietta, followed by a dramatic showdown with Kavinsky and his cronies. Not… Ronan taking a nap, or whatever just happened. Apparently, Ronan taking a nap will help them figure out where Adam is, but Blue can’t piece together _how_.

 

After a few more seconds, Opal pulls something out of Ronan’s hand: a sheet of paper. She hands it to Blue. “The abandoned church,” she reads. “That has to be where Adam is, right?”

 

Suddenly, the lights go out. Or, it seems that way at first; for a few long moments, there’s no light at all, not even filtering in through the windows. When the room brightens, Ronan’s gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Up next:
> 
> _“You survived! Congrats, man.” He pauses deliberately. “At least, some of you did.” When Gansey says nothing, Kavinsky continues. “I would’ve killed to see Lynch’s reaction to Parrish being gone. Priceless. It’s so funny, isn’t it? He thinks fucking around with his girlfriend is real life. Look where that got him.” Kavinsky’s bitter laugh grates on Gansey’s ears._
> 
> _“What’d you do to him?” Blue demands. She and Henry are standing up now._
> 
> _“A magician doesn’t kiss and tell,” Kavinsky hisses._


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait! I'm very forgetful. I'll post another chapter at some point before next Sunday to make up for it.
> 
> TW for violence, suicide. More detailed description in the end notes.

For a moment, no one can do anything but stare at the empty space Ronan’s body occupied just seconds before.

  
  
Well, it’s not quite empty. Opal, comatose, lies in its place. Gansey’s sure Matthew’s in a similar situation, along with the goats back at the Barns and Chainsaw the raven. 

 

“Where did he go?” Blue demands. She turns to her mother. “Can you sense him?”

 

Persephone shakes her head. Jimi says solemnly, “The ley line’s off.” She purses her lips. The unspoken end of her sentence is obvious: _and I don’t think it’s coming back this time._ The implications of Jimi’s words hit Gansey like a bullet. Ronan was in Cabeswater, and Cabeswater disappeared. 

 

“We have to find Adam,” Gansey hears himself say. His voice is clear and commanding, like it is when he talks to his mother’s friends and when his family argues about politics at Thanksgiving. Henry gives him a strange look, halfway between _you’re allowed to not be okay_ and _is this really the time?_

 

"We're taking the car," Blue announces, presumably to Persephone or Jimi. Gansey's rather surprised someone didn't start lecturing him about insensitivity, or something like that. He feels like an intruder, even though it feels like he's been in Henrietta for months instead of days.

 

Gansey sees the conflict flit across the two older women's face: they know they should probably forbid Blue from driving straight into a possibly fatal confrontation, but Adam's been kidnapped and Ronan's trapped in another dimension, so is there really much of a debate? 

 

"You're explaining to Maura when you get back," Jimi says finally. Gansey's glad she said when and not if. 

 

Persephone takes the sleeping Opal in her arms and starts toward the stairs. She looks back at Blue. "Take Dean with you," she says, as if he's a secret weapon Blue can hide in her pocket like her pink switchblade.

 

Dean refers to Mr. Gray. From what Gansey's been able to piece together from little tidbits of information mentioned in passing, Mr. Gray used to work with Greenmantle, and was possibly a hitman. Gansey doesn't feel comfortable around Mr. Gray, but he thinks the man probably has that effect on everyone. 

 

Mr. Gray drives like there's someone chasing them. It reminds Gansey of the drive to the Barns from school with Ronan, not even two weeks ago. He tries not to think any more about Ronan. 

 

Mr. Gray parks the car outside a decrepit old church. Gansey knows that Ronan said (or wrote, more accurately) that the church was abandoned, but Gansey wasn’t prepared for just how much. It’s barely standing up. It manages to dark and haunted even in the hazy light of a bright summer evening. Fifty feet away is a white Mitsubishi Gansey recognizes as Kavinsky’s, and as well as another car.

 

“That’s not a good sign,” Henry points out, glancing over at Blue. 

 

Mr. Gray’s face twists into a grimace at the sight of the second car. “I’m taking a look before you go barging in.” He gets out of the car and shuts the door more quietly than Gansey would have thought possible. There’s no doors in the front to the church, but the frame held up well, giving the entrance the look of a yawning hole to a dark cave.

 

“I don’t know what I’ll do when Adam’s back,” Blue confesses, so softly Gansey thinks he might have imagined it, but then she continues on. “Fucking Ronan sacrificed himself for him. Adam, he…” she stares out of her window, turning her face away from Gansey and Henry’s prying eyes.

 

Gansey doesn’t know Adam and Ronan well enough to know exactly what she’s talking about, but he understands the sentiment. To him, they’ve always seemed like a two-headed hydra: separate and unique beings with fundamentally different cores, but inextricable in every other conceivable way. Seeing Ronan break down at Fox Way isn’t something that’ll leave Gansey’s mind any time soon. If the pragmatic and infallible Adam reacts similarly, Gansey imagines the world might fall out of orbit. 

 

If he voiced that thought aloud, Henry would (hypocritically) chide him for being overdramatic, but it’s difficult to reconcile the Ronan who fought a nightmarish raven-man with the one who cried for fifteen minutes in Blue’s arms. Ronan-and-Adam had been a bulletproof unit, unfazed by the most uncanny of the strange events that befell them throughout the week. Now, though, they may not survive the day.

 

When Mr. Gray returns after an indeterminate amount of time, he knocks on Blue’s window. The three of them get out of the car.

 

“Greenmantle’s in there with Kavinsky.”

 

Gansey frowns. That’s the piece of the puzzle they were missing: Greenmantle hired Kavinsky to fetch Ronan for him, so Kavinsky took Adam knowing Ronan would follow. _That_ plan backfired spectacularly, though honestly Gansey wishes it hadn’t so at least Ronan would be _here_ and not trapped in Cabeswater or possibly dead. “Adam?” He asks. 

 

Mr. Gray sighs. “Tied up and presumably drugged, lying on the altar.” Blue lets out a choked noise of disgust, and Gansey can’t help but feel the same. “Greenmantle was angry. From what I heard, he wanted Kavinsky to give Ronan to him, but—“

 

“But Kavinsky wanted to play his stupid games with Ronan,” Blue snaps. 

 

Mr. Gray nods. “I would really prefer it if you three stayed out here—”

 

Blue scoffs. “No way. Adam’s in there,” she says, leaving no room for argument. Despite only knowing Adam for a week, Gansey can’t help but feel the same absolute certainty. Adam’s in the church, so like the tail to Adam’s comet, Gansey will follow. 

 

Mr. Gray closes his eyes tiredly for a moment, as if to say, _teenagers._ “Follow me, then.” He leads them to the back of the church where the bricks have crumbled enough in one spot to fit a person through. Before they go inside, he whispers, “Don’t confront them unless you must. If you have an opportunity to get Adam and run, take it. I’m going through the front. Don’t move yet.” Gansey nods dumbly, but he doubts it’ll be that simple.

 

Mr. Gray slips away, leaving Blue, Gansey, and Henry alone. Henry takes Gansey’s hand and holds it tightly. It takes a moment for him to realize Henry’s squeezing his hand to silently point out Mr. Gray coming in through the front entrance. It’s a little awkward with the three of them craning to get a look through a hole really only meant for half a person at most, but it works.

 

“Long time no see,” Mr. Gray says casually, interrupting Kavinsky and Greenmantle’s staring contest. “What brings you to Henrietta, Greenmantle?”

 

“Mr. Gray,” Greenmantle replies diplomatically. “I suppose I should have known I’d run into you at some point.”

 

“I suppose you should have.” Mr. Gray takes a menacing step forward. “What business do you have with that boy? I’m rather invested in his wellbeing, I’m afraid.”

 

“You know what I’m looking for,” is all Greenmantle says.

 

“Who the fuck are you?” Kavinsky demands, eyes darting between Greenmantle and Mr. Gray frantically.

 

Mr. Gray shrugs. “An old friend of your friend here.” 

 

Kavinsky walks up to Mr. Gray until they’re almost chest to chest. “Where is he?” 

 

Mr. Gray frowns. “Who?”

 

“Don’t try that shit.”

 

“Frankly, it’s none of your business, but he’s indisposed at the moment.” Mr. Gray pokes Kavinsky in the chest. He stumbles back, cursing loudly. 

 

“I’m going in,” Blue hisses. “I can’t take this.” Gansey grabs her arm.

 

“We’re coming with you.”

 

Silently, the three of them slip through the hole in the bricks. Kavinsky and Greenmantle are still locked in conversation with Mr. Gray, who thankfully doesn’t look up at them. Blue approaches the altar and takes out her switchblade, but Gansey’s foot collides with something. He looks down to find an innocuous little rock skittering away from him. Once the rock comes to a stop, the church is completely silent. 

 

“Oh,” Greenmantle sneers, pulling a gun out of his suit jacket. “It’s you.”

 

Though he is immediately seized with terror, Gansey echoes, “It’s you.”

 

Greenmantle raises his arm. Instantly, Henry pulls Gansey and Blue behind the altar. There’s a thump and a clatter, and some scuffling noises. Gansey peeks his head out and sees Mr. Gray holding Greenmantle in a headlock. Greenmantle scrabbles at Mr. Gray’s arms to no avail. The gun lies on the ground a few feet away from them. Gansey stands up again, thinking himself safe, but Kavinsky’s leaning over the other side of the altar, grinning like a maniac. 

 

“You survived! Congrats, man.” He pauses deliberately. “At least, some of you did.” When Gansey says nothing, Kavinsky continues. “I would’ve killed to see Lynch’s reaction to Parrish being gone. Priceless. It’s so funny, isn’t it? He thinks fucking around with his girlfriend is real life. Look where that got him.” Kavinsky’s bitter laugh grates on Gansey’s ears.

 

“What’d you do to him?” Blue demands. She and Henry are standing up now.

 

“A magician doesn’t kiss and tell,” Kavinsky hisses. 

 

Gansey lets out an involuntary laugh. He probably sounds hysterical, but Kavinsky doesn’t even realize the irony of calling himself the magician, instead of the boy lying in front of him. He feels the need to point out Ronan’s not coming and never will, but it wouldn’t be in their best interests to further incense the man closest to the gun. “It’s nice chatting with you, but we really need Adam back,” Gansey says.

 

Kavinsky raises a hand that had been previously hidden by the altar. In it is a ball of fire. 

 

The fire is not normal fire, or else Kavinsky would not be holding it. It’s black at the centre and pink at the edges, with various shades of red and fuschia in between. Dream fire, Gansey’s mind supplies. Blue once told him Kavinsky has the same abilities as Ronan. “No can do, asshole.” Kavinsky then proceeds to vault himself over the altar. It occurs to Gansey that Kavinsky’s jealous of Adam, pure and simple. He wants Ronan to himself, which means he’ll fight tooth and nail to inflict whatever wounds he can.

 

Gansey, Blue, and Henry jump back. Kavinsky tosses his pink fire from hand to hand like it’s a ball. “It hurts if you touch it,” he informs them. Then, he winks. “But not me.” 

 

“I’d really like it if you put the fire down, thanks.” Henry says airily. “It’s a bit too warm for that this time of year, don’t you think?” 

 

In one swift motion, Kavinsky uses his free hand to pull Henry forward by his collar. “One more word, bitch.”

 

Gansey swallows. Kavinsky’s holding the dream fire up dangerously close to Henry’s neck. Gansey makes brief eye contact with Blue, and together, they yank Henry back, out of Kavinsky’s grip. Before Henry can get back up, Kavinsky lunges at Blue, guns (or rather fire) blazing. Gansey shoves her out of his path at the last second. Blue stumbles but doesn’t fall, instead pulling out her switchblade. Before Kavinsky can turn on Gansey, Henry, still on the ground, hits him in the back of the knees. Kavinsky falters but doesn’t fall. His arms pinwheel in an effort to stay balanced and he grazes Gansey with the fire.

 

It burns like nothing Gansey has ever felt. Though the fire only brushes his arm, his vision whites out for a moment. He crumples to the ground, clutching his arm in agony. The worst thing is that it doesn’t get any better; the blinding, searing pain is so all-consuming Gansey thinks he might go insane.

 

He allows himself a few seconds of wallowing before forcing himself to stand up. If the bright red burn on Blue’s shoulder is anything to go by, she was hit too. In spite of the injury, she’s doggedly holding her switchblade out as she and Kavinsky circle one another. Kavinsky’s back is turned to him, so Gansey takes the opportunity to careen forward, throwing all his weight onto him. Kavinsky crashes to the ground and his fire slips from his grip. Gansey’s not brave enough to kick it away, so he settles for planting himself between Kavinsky and his weapon.

 

“If Ronan were here, he’d give me a real fight,” he sneers. Gansey’s completely unprepared when Kavinsky swings at him. The punch lands; Gansey staggers back and nearly trips over the ball of pink fire, but Henry rushes forward and catches him at the last second. Blue, switchblade pocketed, grabs one of Kavinsky’s bony arms. She ducks away from his swinging free arm and socks him in the neck. Kavinsky flinches back. Before he can make another move, Henry grabs his other wrist. 

 

A quick glance to his right tells Gansey that the Gray Man and Greenmantle are still tussling in front of the pews, which is a shame because Mr. Gray is the only person here with any sort of combat skill who’s not currently fighting against them. 

 

Kavinsky wretches his arms out of Blue and Henry’s grips in a surprising show of strength. He scoops up his dream fire and stands over the altar. He holds the flames over Adam’s face. 

 

“Don’t fucking move,” he growls, “or I’ll kill him.” Adam whimpers. Kavinsky grins. “I might just kill him anyway.”

 

It’s at this moment Mr. Gray barrels into Kavinsky’s side. The ball of fire makes an elegant arc through the air, landing a few feet away and setting the rotting old lectern on fire. Mr. Gray does something that might be impressive in another situation and Kavinsky’s arm crunches nauseatingly. 

 

Greenmantle, now sporting a black eye and a strong limp, joins them, gun in hand. Blue plunges her switchblade into his shoulder before while his hand hovers over the safety. The gun clatters to the ground, and Gansey has just enough time to catch the horrified look in Blue’s eyes before Greenmantle rips the bloody switchblade out of her hand impossibly quickly and puts it against Gansey’s neck.

 

The room seems to stand still. Blue freezes, mouth gaping. Henry’s in the same position a few feet back. Even Mr. Gray pauses his brutal assault on Kavinsky.

 

“Let’s talk about this like adults,” Greenmantle says coolly. If Adam weren’t on the line, Gansey would be completely willing to do whatever Greenmantle asked, but – there’s always a but, isn’t there?

 

Mr. Gray shrugs. “I wouldn’t call attempting to murder two children in an effort to kidnap a third _mature_ , but you and I are very different.” Gansey is constantly being astounded by Mr. Gray’s ability to stay calm. 

 

“Let’s agree to disagree, _Dean_.” Greenmantle says the name like an accusation. Gansey’s not quite sure what’s going on, but he really would rather the knife was removed from his throat as soon as possible. Except, they’re at a bit of a stalemate, aren’t they?

 

“Let him _go_ , you psycho!” Blue shouts after a moment too long of silence. “What do you want with Adam? Ronan’s not coming!” 

 

Greenmantle tuts. His breath is uncomfortably warm on Gansey’s skin. “I can’t just let you _go_ after all this.”

 

“Let me _go_ ,” Gansey cries, though his voice comes out much more steady than he thought he was capable of. There’s a deafening silence for half a second, and that particular feeling of magic in the air.

 

To his great surprise, Greenmantle, who appears to be in a daze, listens. 

 

After another second, Greenmantle comes back to himself. Gansey stumbles over to his friends. Blue looks at him oddly, and Henry looks with wonder.  Suddenly, Mr. Gray exhales sharply, which is the Gray Man equivalent to crying out. Kavinsky has thrown the other man off of him, hands at his throat. Henry wastes no time pulling Kavinsky off of him, which isn’t especially difficult considering Mr. Gray beat him to a pulp just moments before. 

 

Gansey turns around to make sure Greenmantle isn’t charging at him with the switchblade but finds him gone. Blue’s pink knife is all that’s left of him, lying on the floor by a pile of fallen bricks. He moves to grab it, but there’s a strange dragging sound that makes him turn around. 

 

Before babies learn to walk, they learn to crawl, and can do so at astounding speeds, considering their age. This is what Gansey thinks of when Kavinsky pulls himself across the blood-stained carpet toward his pink fireball. In the split second before Kavinsky reaches his target, Gansey grabs one of the stray bricks from the mound by the switchblade. Just as Kavinsky launches his fireball, Gansey hurls the brick. Luckily, his aim is true: they collide, and the fireball by some miracle veers off course, far away from anywhere it could do any harm. Gansey breathes a sigh of relief. This relief lasts for a fraction of a second, right up until he notices the gun in Kavinsky’s hand.

 

It must have landed by the lectern when Greenmantle dropped it. Instead of turning it on anyone, though, Kavinsky puts the muzzle of the gun in his mouth and pulls the trigger.

 

After the ear-splitting sound of the gun firing, the silence is overwhelming. All at once, the pain from Gansey’s wounds hit him. “I’ll take care of him and the fire,” Mr. Gray says calmly. “You get Adam.”

 

Gansey’s not sure he likes the way Mr. Gray phrased his sentence. _I’ll take care of him_ , like Kavinsky’s body is nothing more to him than a nuisance or another obstacle to overcome. Kavinsky wasn’t a good person by any means and Gansey, in all honesty, is happy to see him dead, but relief at a threat who just tried to kill them being eliminated is a joyous feeling that is rather difficult to reconcile with the sickness Gansey feels at the dead boy in front of him. He might throw up. 

 

Gansey forces himself to turn away from Mr. Gray and Kavinsky and gets to work untying Adam. Blue and Henry join him in silence. Their shaky hands extend the process, but Gansey can’t bring himself to care. It’s difficult to lift Adam’s dead weight considering Adam is taller than all three of them, but they manage. Henry and Gansey are holding him up on either side while Blue carries his legs awkwardly to stop them from dragging. As they carry him down the main aisle between the pews, it occurs to Gansey that this feels awfully close to a funeral procession. 

 

Mr. Gray returns from the car and helps them carry Adam. They prop him up in the back seat, which is difficult because Adam barely squeezes in the back of the Fox Way car when he’s awake enough to contort his limbs to fit. Eventually, they get there. Blue and Henry sit in the back with Adam’s sleeping body, leaving Gansey up front with the Gray Man. 

 

They stop at the hospital. Mr. Gray helps them bring Adam inside and explain in the simplest terms possible what happened: _he was drugged at some point during the last hour, we don’t know what with, though._ He’s brought in straight away, as well as Blue and Gansey because of their burns. Henry comes in with Gansey, though he escaped with nothing more than a few bruises. 

 

They tell him he has to stay overnight due to the severity of the burn so they can monitor it. Gansey doesn’t like hospitals; they remind him of being ten years old dying for forty seconds of insect stings. They sent Henry away, so he’s all alone in the uncomfortable, antiseptic hospital bed. Blue is probably in a similar situation; her burn was much bigger than his. She could be stuck here for longer. If Gansey and Blue are trapped here, who will be there when Adam wakes up? Who will explain what happened? What will he think when he blinks awake and Ronan’s not there? The nurses won’t let him get up yet, even though his legs are perfectly fine.

 

“You have an extremely severe third degree burn, Mr. Gansey,” a young nurse says exasperatedly when he asks once again if he can go see Blue and Adam. “You can stay put for a while longer.”

 

“Can my boyfriend come see me?” he presses. “He’s the one I came here with.” The nurse sighs and nods.

 

Henry’s perfect hair is ruined, like he’s been running his hands through it. “I have to stay here overnight,” he says. 

 

Henry is careful not to touch Gansey’s burn as he lies down on the bed beside where Gansey’s sitting. Gansey curls into his side. “Maura’s here,” Henry says finally. “She went in to see Blue. She was pretty frantic.”

 

“Understandably so,” Gansey mutters. “Do you think you can go see Adam? They won’t let me leave, and I doubt they’ll let Jane out either. I’m worried. If he wakes up alone, he might…” Gansey’s not sure what Adam might do, but it certainly won’t be good.

 

Henry nods. “In a few minutes, I will. Are you okay?” He looks meaningfully at the white room around them.

 

Gansey nods. He doesn’t _like_ hospitals, but that takes a backseat to everything else that’s running through his mind like a broken record. Is Blue okay? Will Adam be okay? When can he leave? When will he stop seeing Kavinsky’s body when he closes his eyes?

 

Suddenly, he grins. Henry raises a quizzical eyebrow. “I’m _magic_ , Henry. You felt it, too. I told him to stop and he stopped.”

 

Henry smiles a small, subdued smile. “You’ve always been magic to be, Ganseyboy.”

 

Gansey kisses Henry on the cheek. They lie together for a few minutes in silence. Henry smells like blood and sweat and hair gel, which mixes horribly with the chemical smell of the hospital. Eventually, Henry says apologetically, “I’m going to see if I can see Adam. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Gansey nods and lets himself drift into a dreamless sleep.

 

♕

 

Adam’s eyes are glued shut. Everything feels gauzy and soft, like he’s sleeping in a bed of clouds. It’s nice; he feels calmer than he has in weeks. He takes a deep breath, taking in the smell of—

 

The scent of antiseptic alone sends him into a panic. 

 

He opens his eyes and the crisp white worsens his pounding head. Cheng is in his room, which makes no sense. Where’s Ronan? How did he get here? 

 

“Adam, how are you feeling?” Cheng asks. He sounds like he’s trying to keep his tone neutral, but he fails miserably. His eyes are shadowed by dark circles and there’s a bruise forming on his jaw. 

 

Adam wants to know what happened more than anything. The question is on the tip of his tongue when it all floods back: the car crash, Kavinsky and his pack of dogs, _Greenmantle_. He doesn’t remember anything after someone dumping him in a pew of some church. They were talking about Ronan. He sits up in spite of the thundering pain in his head and says, “Ronan?”

 

Cheng looks away, which is very un-Cheng-like. What won’t he tell him? What happened to Ronan? Why did Adam have to wake up with only Cheng for company? Before he realizes what’s happening, Cheng presses the red call button. It takes this for Adam to notice his breathing is ragged and choked off between sobs. A doctor strides into the room, but Adam barely registers it. He hears something about _we can’t sedate him, we don’t know if it’s out of his system_ , and _is this Ronan person here?_ But Ronan isn’t here and Cheng won’t fucking tell him where he is and he can’t fucking _breathe_ , he just wants _Ronan_.

 

After some indeterminate amount of time, a weight settles on the edge of his bed. Adam’s eyes are too blurry to see who it is. The person gently pushes Adam back onto the bed so he’s lying down and takes his hands, rubbing them soothingly. After his breathing is under control, he blinks his eyes clear. Maura looks back at him with concern. Her red-rimmed eyes say what Cheng couldn’t: Ronan’s gone. He breaks out into sobs again, because he’s tired and Kavinsky fucking kidnapped him and he’s in a hospital and Ronan’s gone, gone, gone. 

 

Maura pulls Adam into her arms. She rubs his back in slow circles and waits for him to cry himself out. A few more nurses come and check on them, leading him to believe it takes a lot longer than it feels for the tears to run out. Finally, she says, “We’ll explain once you’re out of here, okay? Blue and Gansey are here for a while, but you can leave soon. We’ll get him back, Adam. He’s not gone forever.” Maura lets him lie back down and he falls asleep, exhausted.

  
  
  
  
  
  


Persephone shakes him awake. “Time to go,” she whispers. “You’re fine.” Adam would argue that he is _not_ fine, but he lets Persephone help him into a wheelchair without complaint. He fills out some paperwork and then he’s free, except not really because he can still barely walk on his own. He buckles himself into the passenger seat of the Fox Way car and hopes they don’t crash again.

 

Persephone helps him inside and lets him collapse on the couch. He falls asleep immediately; between Kavinsky and the hospital and walking here from the car, he’s ready to sleep for a year. Just before he falls asleep, he thinks of Ronan, but he’s out before he can start to panic again. It’s probably better that way anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The violence is no more than there is in the books, there is burn injuries inflicted if that bothers you. The suicide is by a minor character shooting themself and is described extremely briefly. 
> 
> I suck at writing fight scenes but I tried my best.
> 
> Up next:
> 
>  
> 
> _When Adam wakes up, night has fallen. There’s a pillow beneath his head and a warm blanket covering him. Calla sits in an armchair a few feet away, reading a book as she sips from a mug of tea. Without looking up, she says, “Good morning, Adam.”_
> 
>  
> 
> _“It’s nighttime,” he points out._
> 
>  
> 
> _“Glad to see you’ve still got your wits about you,” she says sarcastically._


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: mentions of suicide.

When Adam wakes up, night has fallen. There’s a pillow beneath his head and a warm blanket covering him. Calla sits in an armchair a few feet away, reading a book as she sips from a mug of tea. Without looking up, she says, “Good morning, Adam.”

 

“It’s nighttime,” he points out.

 

“Glad to see you’ve still got your wits about you,” she says sarcastically. Her voice softens. “How are you feeling?”

 

“Tired.” He takes a breath; he’s not going to freak out this time. “Where’s Ronan?”

 

Calla bites her lip but maintains eye contact. “He used Cabeswater to find out where you were. He got the message through, but the ley line went down before he could get out and he disappeared into thin air. We don’t think the ley line is coming back.” She pauses to let Adam process, then continues, “Opal’s sleeping, and Matthew is too. We called a tow truck for the snake’s car, and the older brother,” she says this with a frown, “dropped by already. He said he’ll be back in a few days.” Adam can imagine how that went. 

 

Disappearing better than Greenmantle taking him, at least. Except, Ronan sacrificed himself for _Adam_. If Adam had been able to fight back when Prokopenko was dragging him to the Mitsubishi, maybe none of this would have happened and Ronan wouldn’t be trapped in the aether. Maybe if Adam refused to leave the Barns, they’d all be safe. 

 

Calla shoves Adam’s legs to the side and sits on the couch beside him. Her hands come up to his face to wipe away tears he didn’t realize were falling. “It’s not your fault, Adam. It’s not your job to save the world.”

 

Adam sniffs. “It’s my job to save him, though.” He knows, even as he says it, that this is untrue. It’s not his duty to keep Ronan from dying. Ronan is his own person who can make his own decisions, but Adam’s need to protect him is as primal as his need for food or water. 

 

Calla shakes her head. “He made the decision, even though it was dangerous. He wanted to save you.” And that’s the kicker, isn’t it. In general, Adam despises it when people give him things. He doesn’t like owing them. It’s okay with Ronan most of the time. Adam knows Ronan would never take pity on him. Still, a life is an awfully heavy thing to give. Adam thinks he might collapse under the weight of it on his shoulders.

 

Calla takes his face in her hands once again and looks him straight in the eyes. “You don’t have to carry this all on your own, Atlas. We’ll find him.” Inexplicably, Adam believes her. 

 

Maura and Cheng come home soon after. They explain that Gansey’s free to leave tomorrow morning, but Blue has another night in the hospital ahead of her. Cheng says they got badly burned in the encounter with Kavinsky. Adam doesn’t ask for more details; he’s not sure how much more of this he can take tonight. He drifts in and out of sleep for the rest of the night, and every time he reawakens he expects to find Ronan beside him. Each time, his hands find empty air. At around midnight, he tries to stay awake just to put an end to it, but it’s too hard. He’s still tired from Cabeswater’s stunt on Wednesday.

 

Eventually, morning light filters in through the cracks in the curtains. Adam blinks awake to find Persephone leaving buttered toast and a glass of water on the coffee table. She looks at him. “You’ll be okay today, I think,” is all she says before disappearing to the Phone/Sewing/Cat room. Unsurprisingly, she’s right. Adam feels well enough to walk around the house without help, though he’s not sure how long it’ll last.

 

“Are you coming to the hospital?” Maura asks when she finds Adam padding around the kitchen. The dark circles beneath her eyes age her twenty years; Adam, Ronan, and Blue probably took ten years off of Maura’s life while they were in high school but Adam’s never seen her this tired. 

 

Adam nods. He doesn’t want to go to the hospital, not really. Hospitals remind him of things he’d rather forget, and he’s not sure how he’ll react around Blue, Cheng, and Gansey all together. It will make what’s missing more pronounced. Still, he knows he’ll feel better after seeing Blue and Gansey safe. He has a shower and gets dressed into yesterday’s car crash clothes. The only clothes at Fox Way that might fit him are the Gray Man’s, and Adam’s not _that_ desperate; Mr. Gray’s clothes would make him feel more unclean than day-old sweatpants. He’s not ready to go back to the Barns yet, even just to gather some of his belongings to bring to Fox Way. He’s not sure if he’ll ever be ready, as long as he has to return alone. Adam loves the Barns, but what made it _home_ was Ronan. 

 

The drive to the hospital feels oddly grim. Cheng and Maura are walking on eggshells around him, and he hates it and appreciates it in equal measure. He wants nothing more than for everything to be normal, but if someone says something about Ronan that rubs him the wrong way, he’ll either fly into a rage or have another panic attack. 

 

Gansey’s already in Blue’s room. Adam’s tired enough that he struggles to make it to the dinky plastic chairs beside Blue’s bed. “I got discharged as soon as I could,” Gansey explains. He looks like he didn’t sleep all night. Adam supposes it’s likely, between Gansey’s insomnia and whatever happened yesterday at the church. 

 

“How are you feeling, Bluebird?” Henry asks.

 

Blue rolls her eyes. “Never better.” 

 

Adam keeps his eyes trained on her face so he doesn’t have to look at the gauze taped to her shoulder, matching Gansey’s. Those wounds are there because they were trying to save Adam. He should feel grateful, but he just feels sick. It had seemed manageable when the worst thing they were facing was Cabeswater going crazy, but now Gansey and Blue were almost killed and Ronan vanished into thin air.

 

“Adam?” Blue’s voice distracts him from his reverie. “Where’d you go?”

 

He shrugs. His traitorous brain asks, _Where did_ Ronan _go?_ “Are you okay? What happened yesterday?” He looks at her shoulder meaningfully. 

 

“I’m going to go get some coffee,” Maura says, glancing between Blue and Adam. Blue looks like she wants to follow.

 

Blue slowly explains the events of the previous day. Adam doesn’t interrupt, mostly because he’s not sure if he could keep his voice from wobbling. She’s holding back tears by the time she finishes the harrowing retelling. It makes a pathetic picture: Blue, with her red-rimmed and purple-ringed eyes, in a flimsy hospital gown with the shoulder pulled down as far as possible, revealing once-white gauze. Gansey, standing at her side like a sentry, clutches his similarly gauze-bound arm so hard his knuckles are white. 

 

“Wait,” Adam says. Something doesn’t make sense. “Gansey told Greenmantle to let go, and he just let go?” There’s a joke about Gansey’s privilege in there somewhere. 

 

“It was magic,” Gansey says, almost reverently. “I’ve never felt anything like it.” The certainty in his voice is enough to convince Adam he’s right.

 

“Could you do it on command?” Adam asks. “Do you know how you did it?”

 

Gansey shakes his head. “You can’t make everything into a science, Mr. Astrophysics,” Blue jokes, and it’s awfully close to something Ronan once said to him when they first discovered Cabeswater.

 

Silently, Adam sits on the edge of the bed. Blue moves to make space for him to lie down. He complies and lets her curl into his side. Adam pretends he doesn’t here her sharp exhales of pain. “I’m sorry,” Blue whispers eventually. Adam knows it’s not an apology sorry. It’s Blue feeling sorry for the way things turned out. “I’m so worried about him.”

 

Adam sighs. The displaced air blows Blue’s hair into his face. The feeling of being tickled is enough to startle Adam; he jolts. Blue exhales sharply at the movement. “Sorry, I… Sorry. Me too.” 

 

Maura returns with coffee for herself, Adam, and Cheng, insisting Gansey and Blue have to _recover, Blue, you can go a day without caffeine_. Adam gently peels himself away from Blue’s side, even though he’d like nothing more than to stay in the tiny bed with her. He’s afraid he’ll hurt her again. 

 

Gansey launches into the story of why he’s interested in ley lines, probably to quell the sad sort of awkwardness hanging in the air. He talks about being ten and lavish parties and his fatal allergy to bee stings. He talks about dying for nearly a full minute and wondering what saved him. If Adam were in a better mood, the story might inspire him. 

 

Gansey’s unwavering belief is… awe-inspiring to Adam. Even after discovering Cabeswater, reconciling _magic_ with the reality he lived in was difficult. Right now, though, he’s less than impressed with Cabeswater, so it’s hard to appreciate Gansey’s story.

 

His thoughts wander back to Ronan, a recurring theme in the story of Adam’s life as of late. He’s desperately clinging to the hope that Ronan’s not lost forever, but if Cabeswater’s physical presence is gone, Ronan is stuck there. There’s no way to reach him without going to his dream version of Cabeswater.

 

Unless there is.

 

“Adam, your coffee’s getting cold,” Cheng points out. 

 

Adam hadn’t realized he was zoned out. His coffee is perfectly warm. Cheng gives him a meaningful look. Adam narrows his eyes. He can’t know what Adam’s thinking. Right?

 

♕

 

There’s nothing they can do, really. They know nothing about the whereabouts of either Greenmantle and they have no way of getting Ronan back. In the two days since the Kavinsky debacle, Fox Way has been tense and overcrowded, especially since Blue’s return home. It’s this that convinces Adam he has to go home; he can see Maura and Calla getting annoyed with his continued presence around the house. He’s not blind.

 

“We’re going back to the Barns today,” he announces at lunch without preamble. 

 

Maura puts down her fork rather forcefully. “Are you sure?”

 

Adam nods. “I have to go back sometime.” He’s not under any false pretenses. It’ll hurt, and it won’t get any better until Ronan comes home. Fox Way, however, is not a permanent solution, and when has Adam been one to take charity?

 

“You can stay as long as you want,” Blue says suspiciously. She knows him too well. “It doesn’t matter if it’s cramped here.”

 

Adam shakes his head. “I can’t just run away from it.” 

 

Blue stirs her yogurt and narrows her eyes. “Don’t do anything stupid. I don’t think Gansey’s smart enough to watch you.”

 

Adam doesn’t laugh, though Blue was clearly expecting it. “I’m fine, Blue.” He’s not in the mood for this. He wants to get it over and done with. 

 

“Don’t worry, Jane, we’ll keep an eye out,” Cheng says, grinning easily, which is 

 

“I don’t need a fucking babysitter,” Adam snarls. So much for a calm front.

 

Blue thrusts her spoon at Adam like an accusation. “That’s exactly why you do. You’re a mess. Zero to one hundred in two seconds.”

 

“What do you think I’m going to _do_ , Blue? Do you not trust me?” And that’s the question, isn’t it. When you grow up with the life Adam did, survival is your first instinct. Keep going, even when it’s hard; consequences come second. 

 

Blue scoffs. “Of course I trust you! But we both know how far you’d go to get him back.” 

 

Blue’s so close to drawing the truth out of him: he wants to scry. If she keeps pressing him, he won’t lie to her, but he’s not going to readily offer the information; he’d be trapped in Fox Way and put under twenty-four hour surveillance. “I’ll be fine. I just want to get it over with.” It’s probably the most honest thing he’s said all morning.

 

Maura gives him an odd look. “Be careful.” 

 

He can’t look her in the eyes when he replies, “I will.”

  
  
  
  
  


 

It takes a few minutes to get inside the Barns because Adam hadn’t exactly brought his house keys with him when they left. Luckily, Ronan forgot to lock the side door. The Barns is exactly as they left it: the blankets that had been covering Ronan and Adam while they slept on the couch on Friday are still in a pile on the floor. The game of Catan is still spread out on the kitchen table. The only difference is that it’s darker: Niall Lynch’s magical power lines are dead, along with everything else.

 

Cheng, who was carrying Opal, asks, “Where do you want her?”

 

He hadn’t thought about this. “In her room is fine,” he answers after a too-long silence. He’s definitely come back here too soon. Seeing Opal’s sleeping body limp in Cheng’s arms is like salt in the wound. Adam’s too weak to hold his fucking kid.

 

He manages to get himself upstairs without help, not for lack of offers. Gansey not-so-subtly watched him toddle up the stairs like some sort of mother hen, which was all sorts of embarrassing and a little infuriating. 

 

Being in Ronan’s bed without Ronan feels like sacrilege. Logically, he knows it’s his bed too, but everything feels _wrong_. The bed is too big without another body on the right side. He feels too cold without Ronan spooning him despite the sticky summer weather. 

 

Eventually, he makes his way back downstairs. Cheng and Gansey are in the living room, locked in some intense debate until they hear Adam’s heavy footsteps. He rolls his eyes and waves them off before opening the fridge in the kitchen. He fills up a bowl with cranberry juice and locks himself in the bathroom, mostly to put off the trip back up the stairs.

 

Though it worked last time, Adam doubts scrying will bring Cabeswater back completely. Best case scenario, this will show him how to bring Ronan and Cabeswater back. Worst case, he ends up wherever Ronan is. It’s a huge risk, especially considering Ronan had only been dreaming when he disappeared. Adam is deliberately separating his soul from his body. For Adam, though, it’s not even a question. 

 

He ends up not in Cabeswater, but in some sort of cave. Ronan is nowhere to be seen. Water drips from the stalactites, pooling in reflective puddles on the ground. There’s no visible light source, but the cave is nowhere near as dark as it should be. After a few moments, Adam realizes he can hear voices coming from somewhere close by, hushed and urgent. His footsteps splash in the pools of water on the ground. The voices stop, then, loudly, “Who’s there?” The voice sounds oddly familiar. 

 

Two women emerge from an adjoining cavern. Adam recognizes one immediately - Neeve. The woman who, so long ago, had tried to kill Adam in a ritual to wake the ley line. With her is a blonde woman with bright green eyes that he assumes is Piper Greenmantle. He knows they can’t see him, but if Cabeswater made it so they could hear him, he most definitely won’t escape unnoticed.

 

“Something’s here,” Neeve says. She gives Piper a meaningful look. “You can remove it.”

 

Adam should leave, but he’d like to know how scrying led to his soul ending up in a cave where Neeve could sense it. He also wants to know how Neeve thinks Piper can get rid of him, though he doesn’t intend on sticking around long enough to experience whatever it is she has planned. 

 

“How?” Piper fingers the locket around her neck.

 

“We’re on the ley line,” Neeve says slowly, as if she were speaking to a child. “And you control the ley line. It’s inside of you.”

 

 _That_ is what he had been afraid of. He’s too far gone, he doesn’t have enough time to try and ground himself before Piper spreads her fingers, raises her hands in Adam’s direction. He feels a tug on something deep inside of him, but he pulls against it. “Come out, come out, wherever you are!” She pulls harder. Whatever it is that has its claws wrapped around Adam’s soul clutches him tighter, almost desperately. “Oh, it _likes_ you.”

 

For half a moment, Adam thinks he’s escaped, but then there’s a vacuum of energy and he’s losing himself, he’s going to _die_ —

 

“Adam!” Someone’s shouting at him. There’s a stinging in his hand. “Adam, snap out of it!”

 

The feeling of sliding back into his body is never pleasant, but Adam couldn’t be more glad for it after what almost befell him. “Adam?” Gansey crouches beside him. “Give me your hand.”

 

He hadn’t even realized he was resisting Gansey’s attempts to grab it. Gansey wraps gauze around his palm, presumably where he was cut to bring him back to reality. It’s not nearly as careful or gentle as Ronan had been when he cut Adam in the very same spot for the very same reason, but he supposes it’s unfair to compare Ronan and Gansey where Adam’s hands are involved. He tries to avoid thinking about Ronan any more. “You were gone for ten minutes, Adam. What did you do?” He doesn’t reply, but this doesn’t seem to surprise Gansey. 

 

“What were you talking about?” Cheng asks once Gansey’s satisfied with his work.

 

“What?”

 

“‘Hello, you’?” When Adam doesn’t respond, Cheng frowns. “You were talking to us.”

 

Adam shivers. “What did I say?”

 

Gansey’s face sours. “‘Come out, come out, wherever you are! Oh, it likes you.’ It didn’t sound like you.”

 

Cheng nods. “It wasn’t your voice. It was a woman’s, but distorted.” He affects a higher pitch and repeats, “Oh, it _liiiikes_ you.”

 

“What does Piper Greenmantle look like?” Adam asks, ignoring them.

 

“Blonde, green eyes,” Gansey replies as Cheng says, “To quote Wendybird, _hot_.”

 

Adam sighs. “That was her talking. I saw her, and Neeve.” But Cheng and Gansey don’t know who Neeve _is_ , so he explains impatiently, “Neeve tried to sacrifice me to the ley line. We thought she was dead. Can you help me up?”

 

As Gansey pulls him into a standing position, he asks, “Why did she try to sacrifice you? What did she want? What’s she doing with Piper?”

 

“She wanted to wake the ley line. I think she’s helping Piper control the ley line.” Oh, fuck. “Piper has complete control over the ley line.” 

 

Gansey, who had been dumping the cranberry juice from the scrying bowl into the sink, freezes. Gansey has poked and prodded Ronan and Adam constantly about how they managed to wake the ley line, but it’s the one subject Adam’s been mum on. Telling Gansey about his sacrifice feels too close to telling him _why_ he needed to make the sacrifice. “Can you tell us what happened while you were there?” Gansey finally asks. His face seems to be warring between horror and a guilty sort of wonder, a juxtaposition to his collected, diplomatic tone. 

 

“I was in a cave. I took a step and it made a noise, which shouldn’t have been possible. Neeve and Piper came from some other connecting cave and Neeve sensed me. She said Piper could… _remove_ me. She said Piper – she said Piper controls the ley line, that it’s inside her. Piper moved her hands toward me and – I was going to die if you didn’t wake me up.” His voice wavers on the last few words. He would have  _died_. 

 

Cheng narrows his eyes. “Did you know you could have died?”

 

Gansey’s eyes widen. “You and Ronan fought over it. He said it was dangerous.” 

 

“Don’t fucking lecture me. You have no idea what’s at stake.” Adam’s _angry_ , he risked his life to see Ronan and Cabeswater gave him Neeve, and now Gansey and Cheng are _worried_ about him.

 

“You were looking for Ronan.” It’s not a question. “What else were you trying to do, Parrish?” Cheng raises his eyebrows.

 

“Jesus, I wasn’t trying to off myself just because he’s gone,” Adam snarls. Who the hell do they think he is? “Why would you think that, assholes? My life isn’t over because my boyfriend’s missing. All I was _trying_ _to do_ was get him back, which is more than any of you have done.” He shoves past them, ignoring their protests. How could they think that? Adam has worked too goddamn hard to waste his life over Ronan. If Ronan doesn’t come back - and that’s a big _if_ \- it’ll hurt more than any bruise ever had, but he’ll survive it. Adam is his own person without Ronan.

 

“Parrish!” Cheng grabs his shoulder. Adam jerks back. The touch had felt like something long-forgotten but all too familiar. It must be show on his face, because Cheng steps back. “Sorry, man, I—“

 

“Don’t _touch_ me.”  There’s a flash of recognition in Cheng’s eyes when Adam’s voice breaks. He’d always been too observant for his own good. “Fuck off.” 

 

“Adam, wait.” Gansey stands a few paces away, hands raised in surrender. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to assume anything. We’re just concerned about you. It’s okay if this is a lot, you’ve lost—“

 

Adam thinks it’s Ronan’s influence on him that makes him say, “You can shove your concern up your ass.” It’s been some time since Adam thought of himself as unknowable. It was always untrue, he supposes, though he only realized that after he learned what it is to be truly known from Ronan and Blue. The feeling greets him like an old friend. He dares not dwell on it because he’s never been self-pitying, but the thought of being the unknown variable because of Ronan’s absence is far from pleasant.

 

He makes it upstairs with no help, mostly out of determination not to stumble so his dramatic exit doesn’t lose its effect. The last few feet down the hall to the bedroom are long and arduous as payment, but Adam couldn’t care less once he throws himself into Ronan’s stupidly luxurious bed with his grossly expensive sheets.

 

He hasn’t given himself any real time to - to _grieve_ Ronan’s disappearance. It feels like he’s been one misstep away from some sort of nuclear detonation. He hasn’t allowed himself to think about the possibility that he won’t come back, lest the hope for Ronan’s survival should crumble in his hands. In Ronan’s bed, though, with only memories to keep him company, it’s harder to keep hold of the dogged belief in Ronan’s continued existence. Adam closes his eyes.

 

Persephone always tells him that time is _not_ like a river, but you could think of it that way. She says that to see the future, instead of letting the river carry you downstream, you must swim against the current. This has never made much sense to Adam. How does he swim against the current of time if time isn’t a river anyways? Calla always says Adam takes magic too literally, too logically when he explains his inability to see past the present, with her smirk and booming laugh. 

 

Now, though, Adam sees, which shouldn’t be possible given the circumstances. Maybe Persephone’s wrong; it does feel remarkably like a river. Time pulls him backwards, but he swims forward. Or maybe it’s not a river, maybe it’s an ocean. It’s vast, somehow, and electric. Like the warmth of a tarot card waiting to be plucked from a hand multiplied by every second that’s ever been and will be from the beginning of time till its infinite end. 

 

It’s trying to tell him something, though, so Adam lets the ocean take him in its depths.

 

It’s all rather vague. He sees a jumble of information. None of it makes any sort of sense; there’s glimpses of darkness. He gets a feeling of _bad_ , of loneliness and desperation. Death in all its forms, and chaos that stretches from past to future. Hands around his neck, or perhaps the other way around. Dark ooze drowns him, which feels oddly familiar. Images flash through his mind of Cabeswater, first like he knows it: beautiful and strange and alive, but it slowly becomes overcome with the dark black stuff they saw on the tree when they visited the ley line. The second path is warmer. More sensations overcome him: fear, release, euphoria, pain. A gasp of pleasure, every kind of bruise. The feeling of being used like a puppet. A hard-won battle, cuts that reach deeper than skin. Ronan’s lips on his throat, Ronan black and blue. Everything feels inevitable and impossible.

 

Adam’s eyes fly open. The thrum of Cabeswater disappears as quickly as it came. He takes in a gasp of air like he’s just come up from swimming underwater a second too long. That’s not how psychics are supposed to see the future, right? It’s supposed to be with tarot cards and scrying and _order_ , not random visions. Still, it was the future all the same; Adam _is_ one to look a gift horse in the mouth, but he’s happy to appreciate this without complaint until he can talk to Persephone. It’s at this precise moment someone knocks on the open bedroom door. Adam doesn’t try to sit himself upright, so he just waves his hand vaguely.

 

Gansey appears at his side holding his phone. He pulls Adam into a sitting position and says, “It’s Jane,” before handing him the phone. 

 

“Blue?” His voice is slightly breathless. The emptiness at the back of his mind where Cabeswater’s hum usually resides (or used to) feels more pronounced, somehow.

 

“It was back,” is all Blue says. 

 

“I saw the future.” The words taste sweet in his mouth. In some ways, Calla was right when she claimed Adam was too logical for magic. He’s studied tarot more than any art so vague should be studied. He’s the perfect conduit for Cabeswater, but he might be the worst psychic in the world. 

 

“What did you see?” There’s pride in her voice. The old Adam, or perhaps the current Adam in a more inflammatory mood would have taken offense at that. It would have felt like Blue taking credit for his achievement. This Adam, though, is nothing but grateful.

 

“I don’t know, really. It was dark and…” he trails off. Just the memory of the sheer hopelessness makes him shiver. “It was a mess of images and feelings. I don’t know what to make of it.”

 

“Persephone will probably help you with that. She was asking about you before I called. I guess she knew something was up.” Blue pauses. “You’re really psychic.” 

 

“I know.” But it comes out more like a sigh, more like an ‘I _know_ , right?’.

 

“Gansey said something happened.” It’s a statement and a question wrapped all in one. Adam doesn’t like it. 

 

“Gansey doesn’t know anything.” Though that’s not quite true, is it? When Gansey knocked politely on Adam’s already-open door, Adam wanted to tell him about what he saw, wanted to experience the _wonder_ of magic the way only Gansey seems to be able to. He wanted to share it, despite all the reasons he shouldn’t.

 

 “Adam.”

 

“I scried.”

 

“You self-sacrificing _idiot_ , I cannot _believe you_ , Adam Parrish—”

 

“Gansey and Cheng thought I was trying to kill myself.” Blue, stunned into silence, says nothing. Adam continues, staring Gansey, whose red face is pointed studiously at the ground. “They had to pull me out, and they asked what else I was trying to do.”

 

It takes Blue a few seconds to string coherent words into a sentence. “They– What? I mean– I’d kill them if we weren’t already one man short.” It’s just awkward enough that Adam and Blue both laugh. Adam wishes he were still at Fox Way. “Put Gansey back on the phone,” Blue hisses once she regains her composure, “I want to tear him apart.”

 

“Not yet,” Adam says because he misses Blue in that moment, inexplicably, almost as much as he misses Ronan. He waves Gansey away and flops back into the silky mound of blankets. “We haven’t really talked.” About what, he’s not sure.

 

“How’s home?”

 

Adam could deflect this question with a flippant remark. Instead, though, he says deliberately, “I don’t know. Haven’t spoken to him in a while.”

 

Blue scoffs affectionately, somehow. “You’re so gross. You know you can come back, right? It doesn’t matter if Calla gets annoyed with too many teenagers around the house. I know you didn’t want to go back without…” She stops herself abruptly.

 

“I hate it here alone.” It’s an admission he’d only ever confess to Blue. “But I can’t leave.”

 

“You can be sad about him. No one’s going to think whatever you’re thinking they’ll think.”

 

“If I let myself be sad about him, it’s as good as admitting he might not come back.” And that’s the truth Adam’s been skirting around, isn’t it? He’s faced hardships greater than this (has he?) and survived, but if he lets this fear in, he might fall apart.

 

“That’s pretty messed up.”

 

“Yeah, well.”

 

She sighs. “I don’t think any of us are the paragon of mental health, but if you want to be sad, I’ll listen. Okay?”

 

“Why would I want to be sad?”

 

“You know what I mean. Ass.”

 

“Same goes for you.” He pauses. “Ass.”

 

Blue laughs, a little wildly. “I know this is how you two flirt, Adam. I’m nobody’s mistress.”

 

This, for some odd reason, sobers Adam up. “Blue, I don’t know what to _do_.” He exhales sharply. “There was so much we never talked about.”

 

It’s easy, after that, to let out what he’s been keeping in. Once the floodgates are open, they’re impossible to shut. Ronan could be dead or suffering at the hands of Piper Greenmantle or any number of horrible fates Adam has no way of preventing. Opal and Matthew, more family than the Parrishes ever were, would be gone too, and how is Adam supposed to deal with that? Moreover, Adam and Ronan never talked about what happens after Adam graduates: does Ronan move from the Barns, or do they do long distance forever? Will Adam ever find out? There’s so much Ronan Adam might never get to know. 

 

By the end of the phone call, Adam’s eyes are sufficiently puffy. He leaves Gansey’s phone on the nightstand for him to come and find. He hopes he’s awake for Blue’s verbal filleting of Cheng and Gansey’s accusations from earlier, though he’s not sure he’s ready to field their well-meaning but awkward apologies.

 

It’s only when Adam is well on his way to sleeping that he realizes he never told Blue what he saw while scrying.

 

♕

 

Being inside Cabeswater full-time is _not_ the party one might expect, not that Ronan thought it would be. Especially since the forest is rapidly decaying around him. It’s just like the tree he saw when they visited Cabeswater the week before, except it’s the whole forest. He has been diligently avoiding the black sludge eating away at the trees for fear of what might happen if he touches it. All of Cabeswater feels… caged, somehow. He has yet to reach the end of the forest (not for lack of effort), but he’s sure it exists. 

 

Sometimes, the forest screams and cries more sludge. Ronan’s pretty sure that means that Piper is using it for something. Piper is probably what’s caging it, now that he thinks about it. Now that he’s actually _in_ the ley line (whatever the fuck that means), it’s easy to tell that Piper’s not just taking its energy, she’s using it for herself. For what, Ronan can’t see, since he’s effectively trapped in the barrel of her gun.

 

The worst thing about it is that he has no idea how long he’s been here. It could have been an hour or a year, for all he knows. He tries not to think about it, mostly; it’s too easy to go insane in this place to start considering all the fatal outcomes of his situation. He might go insane anyway, because this Cabeswater has an unreal, hazy atmosphere that calls Ronan to surrender himself to it. It’s a little terrifying, honestly; if he goes off his guard for too long, it might take him. He’s not eager to find out what would happen if he submitted to it.

 

He spends most of his time worrying about Adam. Ronan trusts the others freed him from Kavinsky’s hands, but he has no way of knowing for certain. If Adam survived that, and Ronan can only hope, he’s probably as worried out of his mind as Ronan is. He wants Cabeswater to hurry the fuck up and snap out of it already, but it’s not looking good.

 

Ronan’s wandering by a lake that is entirely full of the strange, dark substance when the forest rumbles. He sighs and covers his ears when, like clockwork, the inhuman screeching sound picks up again. “Fuck you, Piper,” he mutters to himself as he makes his way away from the black lake before it starts to spill over its banks. 

 

Something seems different about this time, though. When Cabeswater is in pain, it permeates the forest. If it ever feels some approximation of emotions and sensations, Ronan’s stuck along for the ride. Now, it’s killing itself under the stress of bending to Piper’s will or fighting against her hold on it or whatever the fuck is going on, but it’s stopped keening incomprehensibly. He unplugs his ears to find the trees talking, or some approximation of it. It takes him a few seconds to realize that they’re repeating the same word over and over, and a few more seconds to discern the word from the foreboding chorus: _magician, magician, magician_. Ronan could scream, or cry. If he does both, no one else is with him to witness it, anyway. 

 

Ronan is not entirely sure what this means. Adam is too far away to reach Ronan since Ronan is still alone in his stupid forest. If he’s close to it without actually _being_ there, that probably means there’s some barrier between Cabeswater and the rest of the world. Logically, the answer is Piper, but he’s not sure. He hates not knowing, and he especially hates having Adam in such close proximity without being able to touch or even _see_ him.

 

After another torturous couple of seconds, the strain on the forest disappears and its chanting quiets. Momentarily, Ronan is glad for the release of pressure, but then it catches up with him that Adam had (presumably) been close enough for Cabeswater to touch, and now he’s gone. 

 

“Mother _fucker_ ,” he roars into the rattling tangle of branches. Even apart from the stress of not knowing if everyone he loves has been killed by fucking Kavinsky or even old age, Ronan is tired of wandering around this stupid goddamn endless forest. The wonder that usually accompanies trips to Cabeswater is as dead as the trees around him. He’s going to go crazy if he’s stuck in here for too long, he knows it. The loose grip on time is already driving him nuts. If the sludge doesn’t kill him, that certainly will. 

 

“Can’t you fight back?” Ronan asks after a particularly close encounter with the oozing black stuff. “You gotta have some power left if she’s using you to fight people or what the fuck ever.” Like always, there’s no answer. “You have to _do something_! I don’t want to die here, you stupid goddamn overgrown garden!” 

  
This seems to spur Cabeswater into action. Maybe it’s the idea of the Greywaren dying. Whatever it may be, Ronan doesn’t really care, as long as it works. It seems to whir to life. The wind picks up, but the dry boughs don’t clatter against one another like they should. It brightens almost imperceptibly in spite of the lack of a light source. It says nothing, though Ronan’s not sure why he expected anything else. 

 

His mind wanders back to what Cabeswater said when they went to see it with Gansey, the same words Persephone echoed that helped Ronan find out where Kavinsky took Adam: _the answers you seek lie beyond your reach, but behind ours_. It doesn’t make any sense. Ronan supposes it’s not meant to be taken literally, but it’s not like he has much else to do, so he plants himself at the base of a relatively sludge-free tree.

 

Beyond Ronan’s reach just means outside of Cabeswater, which starts with Piper (if his estimations and guesswork are correct) and ends with everything else. Behind Cabeswater’s reach seems equally unhelpful. Is anything outside of Cabeswater’s reach? Maybe it means Piper’s reach, since the two seem to be synonymous these days. The forest is ‘behind’ Piper’s reach in a way, he supposes. If she’s out there, she can’t come in here. This, however, leads him back to square one: the answer lies beyond outside this forest, but behind it. What could be both in Cabeswater and outside of it?

 

The answer is startlingly simple: Ronan. Or rather, his creations. They are born in his dreamscape, which is also Cabeswater, but then come to exist in reality. This impossible feat uses Cabeswater’s power, which gives him an idea.

 

This version of Cabeswater seems to be the real Cabeswater that usually sits on the ley line, but Ronan never actually left his dreamscape, which incidentally is also another manifestation of Cabeswater. This leads him to believe that whatever place he’s trapped in is some amalgamation of the two. If he treats this like a dream, he should theoretically be able to draw on Cabeswater to create whatever he wants.

 

God, he feels like Adam.

 

 _Should_ is the key word. Cabeswater’s a hop, skip, and a jump away from dying. If he attempted to make something now, it would be like trying to take water from a dried-up well. It can’t be impossible, though. If Ronan could get the forest to come to life even minutely, he can do this.

 

In the end, it’s not difficult. Cabeswater is eagerly at his every beck and call and Piper probably didn’t prepare for having a person, let alone the Greywaren, in her personal battery. He lets himself succumb to the illusive fog poking at the edges of his mind. The poking turns to furious something or other; it feels like Cabeswater is taking up space in his brain, somehow. Too much. (This is probably what Adam felt like when Cabeswater took his eyes. No fucking wonder he could barely stay awake.) From there, it’s like he’s in a dream: he picks up picks up a stick from the ground. He blinks, and it transforms into a wooden sword. Whatever. It doesn’t matter what it is, as long as he uses enough of Cabeswater’s power to… he’s not sure, exactly, what the plan is. It’ll do _something_ , which is better than what he’d been doing before, which was nothing. 

 

Before he can try to push Cabeswater out of his mind, it springs back itself. The fogginess recedes. The sludge begins to ebb at an agonizingly slow pace, but it ebbs all the same. Ronan’s not exactly sure how what he did helped, but Cabeswater’s been resuscitated. Or something. 

 

“ _MAGICIAN_ ,” Cabeswater says. “ _PAENITET, PAENITET, PAENITET_.”

 

A series of confusing images flash before Ronan’s eyes. He knows with utmost certainty that somewhere in the real world, Adam is seeing them too. It’s glimpses of the future, or something. Ronan’s pretty sure it’s an apology for stealing Adam’s eyes from him. An eye for an eye, or some other biblical shit like that. 

 

It’s barely been a minute when Piper starts to fight back. There’s no question on who will win. Piper has an iron grip on Cabeswater; she’ll never let it out of here. Ronan, on the other hand isn’t even sure where _here_ is.

 

He hopes Adam appreciates Cabeswater’s gift, considering the trouble it was worth. It’s all he’ll get of Ronan for a while.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm at beetlejeuse.tumblr.com. Comment, kudos, etc. Updates should be back to the regular schedule after this.
> 
> Up next:
> 
> _“You know,” Orla says to Adam as she combs through the fridge for something edible, “I’m really sorry about your boyfriend.”_
> 
> _“Shut up,” Blue says with a roll of the eyes, “you’re just sad you can’t ogle him anymore.”_
> 
> _Orla waves her hand vaguely. “I’m not that vapid, little cousin.”_
> 
> _“I forgot to say on the phone what I saw when I was scrying yesterday,” Adam interrupts._
> 
> _“You really are developing a bad habit with all that scrying, Adam. Do you have any orange juice?” Orla asks, leaning on the fridge._


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, it is Wednesay and not Sunday, but in my defense school started this week. Next update should be on time (they say, as if they don't intend to update every Sunday and then forget). Thanks for your patience with my forgetfulness.

“You know,” Orla says to Adam as she combs through the fridge for something edible, “I’m really sorry about your boyfriend.”

 

“Shut up,” Blue says with a roll of the eyes, “you’re just sad you can’t ogle him anymore.”

 

Orla is at the Barns because Blue’s burns have her on pain medication that don’t allow her to operate heavy machinery, and Blue is nothing if not careful about driving, something Ronan bullied (bullies) her for intensely and mercilessly. 

 

Orla waves her hand vaguely. “I’m not _that_ vapid, little cousin.” 

 

“I forgot to say on the phone what I saw when I was scrying yesterday,” Adam interrupts. 

 

“You really are developing a bad habit with all that scrying, Adam. Do you have any orange juice?” Orla asks, leaning on the fridge.

 

Adam shakes his head. “Opal drinks it all. Do you want to know what I saw or not?”

 

Orla rolls her eyes. Blue sighs. “Ignore her.”

 

Adam figures it’s better not to beat around the bush. “Piper and Neeve were in some cave. Neeve said Piper controlled the ley line.”

 

Blue and Orla stare at him. Eventually, Blue says, “Neeve died. She got lost in the mirrors.” The doubt in her voice rings louder than her words.

 

“I guess not,” Adam mutters.

 

“That’s not who you were looking for,” Orla says self-importantly.   


 

Adam sneers, halfway to a snarl. “Doesn’t take a psychic to figure that one out.” Ronan’s name goes unsubtly unsaid. 

 

Blue and Orla don’t say anything for a long while; no one’s in the mood to even start to consider what Neeve’s presence could mean for them, for Ronan.

 

Orla finally pours herself a glass of chocolate milk and plants herself at the kitchen table with Blue and Adam. “What you saw wasn’t normal,” Orla says after a generous gulp of milk. Her electric green nails tap rhythmically on the wooden table. 

 

Adam frowns. 

 

Orla raises an impatient eyebrow at him. Her lacquered nails click faster. “Your vision? I heard Blue talking on the phone.”

 

Blue rolls her eyes. “I don’t listen in on _your_ conversations.”

 

Orla forms a delicate moue with her bright red lips. “You should be so lucky.” 

 

“What do you mean?” Adam asks, even though he knows exactly what she means, and Orla knows Adam knows. According to every piece of Persephone’s tutelage and Maura’s readings and Calla’s lessons subtly disguised as chastisement, hints of the future shouldn’t come so vividly and clearly. Especially when Adam wasn’t doing a reading or scrying and Cabeswater was half-dead anyway. He wants to ask _what did it mean?_ but he doesn’t like asking for help, and certainly not from Orla. 

 

Henry emerges from the living room and sits beside Blue. “I don’t suppose there’s any more chocolate milk, is there?”

 

Orla gestures to the fridge, giving Henry a look she usually (used to?) reserves for Ronan. Henry tosses a glance over his shoulder at Adam as he rummages through the fridge. “Gansey’s on the phone with his parents right now, but he wanted to talk to you about Cabeswater.”

 

Quite honestly, Cabeswater is the last thing on Adam’s mind right now. Cabeswater leads to Ronan which leads to everything Adam refuses to think about. Nonetheless, if he wants Ronan back they have to solve this puzzle. 

 

He thinks of the last time he saw Ronan, before the BMW crashed. They’d been just a room over from where he sits now. He can barely remember that day now because of how tired he’d been. Some vignettes are crystal clear: Ronan carrying him down the stairs (Ronan’s _arms_ , God),  Cheng making pancakes. Mostly he remembers Kavinsky shoving him into the Mitsubishi and giving him a bitter-tasting capsule, and then… the hospital. Losing his shit in front of Cheng and Maura. The bits in between are just out of reach, no matter how hard Adam tries.

 

“Adam?”

 

Adam looks up to find Gansey sitting across from him. “What?”

 

“I was hoping to talk about Cabeswater? I’ve come up with some theories, but you’re the expert.” He smiles sheepishly, like he’s ashamed to ask. Maybe Adam and Ronan have been too hard on him and Cheng.

 

“Shoot.”

 

Gansey looks immensely pleased like the cat that got the cream, or in his own Ganseyish way, a predator whose prey just fell into its trap. His eyes brighten like Adam’s never seen. It’s impossible to look away. “I’m only spitballing here, of course, but what seems most likely to me is that Cabeswater isn’t stationary like we thought. I know you’ve said it’s disappeared before, but these circumstances are entirely different. Cabeswater’s disappearance means the ley line is sapped of energy, and Piper cannot use its power if it has none. It’s possible that it’s simply moved somewhere else. If Cabeswater is a product, or a manifestation, more accurately, of the ley line and Piper is in control of the ley line, it could be following her.” Gansey’s bright eyes dim a little as he continues. “If Ronan was in Cabeswater when it moved, so to speak, then it makes sense that he was taken with it.”

 

Adam nods. It makes sense for the most part, but hope is a luxury he cannot afford. “If Cabeswater moved with Ronan in it, why can’t he get out?”

 

Gansey shrugs helplessly. “I wish I could tell you.”

 

“Ronan wasn’t in _Cabeswater_ -Cabeswater when he disappeared, though,” Blue points out. “He was in his dream Cabeswater, which I doubt he could just walk out of.”

 

Adam shakes his head. “He’d have to wake up, but he’s…” Dead. Stolen. Disintegrated. All of the above.

 

Gansey sighs. “Nothing else I can think of makes any sense.” He runs a hand through his hair with all the frustration of a wild animal trapped in a cage (that’s not exactly accurate - it would be, if Gansey were capable of looking anything but put together at all times). 

 

The chime of the doorbell cuts Adam off before he can reply. He frowns. There’s no one he can think of who’s likely to be at the door that he actually _wants_ to talk to. He opens the door to find Declan. In Declan’s arms, Matthew’s limp body hangs. Adam maintains eye contact with Declan and resolutely does not look down.

 

“Parrish.”

 

“Declan.” He moves out of the doorway. “Come in.”

 

Declan looks at Adam with thinly veiled hostility. “I’ll put Matthew in his room. I don’t plan on staying.”

 

Adam follows Declan upstairs. He’s not sure he wants the others to hear whatever’s about to happen. Declan sets Matthew down in his bed and Adam leads him to the office that used to be Niall’s, but Adam now mostly uses to work when he’s home on a break. 

 

“That witch told me Ronan disappeared and you don’t know how to get him back.”

 

Adam nods. “We’re trying.”

 

Declan scowls. “I lost both my brothers in one day, Parrish. Trying isn’t good enough.”

 

Adam can never tell how Declan feels about him. On one hand, he doesn’t like that Adam led Ronan to the homosexual lifestyle or whatever the hell he thinks and usually treats him with the same disdain he would his younger brother. On the other hand, Declan, when it suits him, acts like Adam is a more rational extension of Ronan. Today is leaning toward the former.  

 

“If you’re not too preoccupied with your dick-measuring contest, I’d be happy to take any suggestions on how to get him out of his dreamscape,” Adam snaps. “I know you think I’m intent on leading him into a life of sexual deviancy, but you must know I care about him if you’re as smart as you act like.” 

 

Declan has the grace to look away. It’s as close to an apology as he’ll get. “I don’t think anything like that, _Jesus_ , Parrish,” he replies, as if this the most obvious thing in the world. “I just think he’s young and stupid.”

 

Adam has always known that Declan doesn’t know Ronan very well at all, but his refusal to understand his brother is solidified in that moment. Disregarding the blatant bullshit about Ronan’s sexuality, it’s obvious to everyone but Declan that Ronan doesn’t have a rebellious streak, but a rebellious personality. Adam’s lips curl into a sneer. “So you’re not homophobic, you just don’t like Ronan being gay. Insightful.” 

 

Declan scoffs. “I’m not fucking _homophobic_ , I just–” He takes a calming breath, closes his eyes for a few seconds to slip back into his clean and pressed facade. “We’re getting off topic. How do you plan on getting him back?” 

 

Adam wishes more than anything that he had an answer. “I don’t know. If we find Piper, maybe we’ll find Cabeswater and Ronan.”

 

Declan cocks an unimpressed eyebrow. “That’s a big if.”

 

“If I had some grand plan to storm Piper’s secret hideout and rescue Ronan from his tower, we wouldn’t be having this conversation, would we?”

 

Declan’s hands curl into fists. Adam barely suppresses a flinch. “I’ve been trying to get rid of Greenmantle, but I used up all my bargaining chips on him. He’s stirring up the Greywaren rumours all over again.” This is a huge admission from Declan, considering he usually keeps the rest of his family in the dark about everything to do with Niall Lynch’s business, but Adam won’t take the bait. 

 

He crosses his arms and cocks his hip. “Trying isn’t good enough.”

 

Declan runs a hand through his hair. “For fuck’s sake, Parrish, I’m trying to help you. Don’t be childish.”

 

“Don’t treat me like shit just because your personal punching bag’s gone missing and I’ll consider it.” Adam leans back against the wall and waits for Declan to get whatever it is he’s trying to say out. He’s similar to Ronan in this way: he barks and bites until someone tires him out and the truth he was dancing around is uncovered. Of course, this means that Ronan and Declan fight at every turn, but Adam supposes there must be some positive to the fact that they’re alike in more than looks. 

 

“I’m trying my best to keep him safe,” Declan finally says, tension evident in his strained voice, “but I can’t if you two keep getting up to shit like this.”

 

“He got himself into this.” Adam’s not sure how much Calla told Declan about what happened, but he doesn’t want to be the one to tell Declan that Ronan sacrificed himself for him. Adam doesn’t even like _thinking_ about that.

 

“Idiot.” Declan looks up at the ceiling, either lost in thought or overcome with frustration. Probably both. “I don’t want to lose him.”

 

“I’m not exactly gunning for that either.” 

 

“Can’t you take this seriously? He’s such a bad influence on you.”

 

Adam steps forward, just a touch closer than Declan would consider comfortable or appropriate. “When I woke up at the hospital and found out Ronan was gone, I had a panic attack so long and severe they wanted to sedate me. Except they couldn’t, because they didn’t know what drugs Kavinsky gave me when he kidnapped me. Ronan was trying to figure out where K took me when he disappeared. I don’t care if you don’t think I’m taking this seriously. I couldn’t give less of a shit about what you think about me. If you’re just going to guilt me for losing my boyfriend, get the fuck out.” 

 

“I just want to help get him back, Parrish,” Declan growls. “You don’t have a monopoly on him.”

 

“Yeah, well, if you look out of your ivory tower, maybe you’ll notice wanting him back doesn’t do shit.” Adam’s voice cracks on the last word, an inadmissible error. Declan’s eyes widen in blatant surprise, but before he can say anything, Adam leaves and slams the door in his wake. He storms down the stairs and ignores his friends’ protests in favour of going outside.

 

All of a sudden, he feels a burst of resentment for Ronan. Why would he leave Adam like that? Why would he leave him to deal with this all alone? He remembers the fight they had the day after Adam came home from Cambridge, when Ronan told him not to scry. Ronan had been scared of Adam deliberately putting himself in a life-threatening situation. He didn’t want Adam to choose to put himself in enough danger that he might die and leave Ronan alone. 

 

If Ronan were here, Adam would pick a fight with him, but that’s the crux of the problem, isn’t it?

 

Adam finds himself in a clearing of some sort. It’s perfectly circular, lined with looming oaks. The grass is impossibly soft on Adam’s socked feet, but there are divots in some spots that look like claw marks. The same marks are on some of the trees. This must be where Ronan fought his nightmare creature.

 

Adam feels very young all of a sudden. For all of his premature maturity, he’s only nineteen. He doesn’t know how he’s supposed to act in this sort of situation. What do you do when your boyfriend is taken from you by magic? When the disappearance of the aforementioned boyfriend also results in a comatose daughter? There’s no precedent for it. Adam’s no stranger to magic. He wouldn’t have gotten this far if the impossible fazed him. Now, though, it’s all so _much_. He feels like a little kid, or at least how he imagines the kind of little kids who were allowed to want things might feel: he just wants Ronan _back_ , he doesn’t care how impossible it is or how far away he might be. He _wants_ , so badly he feels sick with it. 

 

“Adam?” Adam turns around to see Gansey standing at the edge of the glade. The mid-afternoon light filtering through the trees casts him in a strikingly handsome light, like a forest deity in his domain. Adam doesn’t reply, so Gansey says, “Are you alright? I know you don’t… get along with Declan.”

 

Adam scoffs. “He’s an asshole.”

 

Gansey steps closer with the caution of someone approaching a feral animal. “Do you want to talk about what happened?”

 

“No.” He’s tempted to add a perfunctory _fuck off_ , but he doesn’t because he knows it’s only Ronan’s influence on him that would make him even consider telling Gansey to fuck off, and he doesn’t want to… he doesn’t know. He doesn’t want to think about Ronan, but that’s next to impossible. Adam wants to commiserate with Ronan about how much of a dick Declan is, and then maybe let Ronan convince him that they should have sex in Declan’s old room for revenge. Adam does _not_ want to talk to Gansey, who knows nothing about Cabeswater or Ronan or Declan or Adam.

 

“I’ll just sit here, then.” And Gansey does. He sits at the base of one of the oaks and busies himself with playing with the grass. Adam sits down too, because he feels awkward standing in the middle of the clearing while Gansey watches. Eventually, Gansey says, “Jane went to yell at Declan. I fear for his life.”

 

The thought of all five feet of Blue storming into the study to rip Declan a new one makes Adam crack a smile. “He’d have to have a heart to die, so I’m not worried.” Adam tips his head back against the tree and stares up at the sky.

 

“It’s okay to miss him. You’re allowed to grieve, Adam,” Gansey says quietly, a well-meaning but violating non sequitur.

 

“He’s not dead.” Adam looks down and looks Gansey in the eyes, glaring viciously. Then, without thinking, he snaps, “You think I don’t fucking miss him? He’s my...” Boyfriend doesn’t feel adequate, despite its veracity. 

 

Gansey waits for Adam to finish his sentence, but when he doesn’t, he sighs. “I don’t mean to imply you don’t miss him. I just mean that you don’t have to put on a front for us, or spend every waking minute searching for a solution. I know it’s hard for you.”

 

“No, you don’t,” Adam spits out unthinkingly. That’s what’s been been bothering him, what’s been niggling at the back of his mind since Declan spewed his bullshit. It’s _not_ just that Adam misses his boyfriend, though that is undoubtedly true. He feels like he’s been flayed wide open; Ronan has been stolen by something they thought was _theirs_ , as much as a magical forest could be. 

 

They have so many names, so many iterations: Lynch and Parrish, Adam and Ronan, Magician and Greywaren. The moment they kissed for the first time, Adam knew Ronan was it. There’s no word for what they are, not really. They’re bound together for life, by rituals and Cabeswater and _love_. They are unbreakable, infallible, eternal. Adam and Ronan were forged in fire and fucking brimstone. 

 

♕

 

After fishing around for a pair of Ronan’s boots in one of the Barns, Adam walks around for a while more to get rid of the fraught energy in his chest. He hadn’t meant to get angry at Gansey, but his meticulous compartmentalization is falling apart. If he’s not careful, he’ll bleed is emotions out all over.

 

He finds himself near the far end of the property, long past the farthest Barn. There’s a copse of ancient-looking hickory trees, which is odd. He’s sure he remembers coming here with Ronan not too long ago; there had been a thicket of young, fragile evergreens. Maybe he’s not where he thought he was. The forest around the Barns is expansive, after all. It’s too easy to get lost.

 

He wanders deep enough into the woods that he starts to worry about getting lost. He’s lived at the Barns long enough to know his way around intimately, but this is new territory. The evergreen trees are unbelievably thick and tall, giving the forest floor a gloomy complexion uncharacteristic for this time of day. He nearly trips over a fallen tree trunk. The sprawling root system sticks straight up, much taller than Adam. It occurs to him he’s never seen a dead tree, or a dead _anything_ at the Barns before. 

 

He climbs over the tree and almost falls straight down. A fissure in the ground cleaves the earth in two, leaving a yawning hole that stops not a foot away from where Adam’s standing. It’s hard to parse in the darkness, but it looks like a cave. There should _not_ be a cave here. He digs his heel into the ground to confirm what he already knows. He’s standing on firmly-packed dirt, and the rest of the ground excluding the cave is undoubtedly the same. In spite of this truth, the cave exists. If Adam looks too hard at where the top of the jagged stone walls of the cave turn to earth, his head hurts; magic, then, though what else would it have been?

 

He considers, briefly, finding Blue or Gansey or Cheng to explore the crack in the ground with him. It’s most definitely unsafe to go on alone. However, if he makes the trek to the house and all the way back, will the cave even still be there? He’s certain Ronan would have mentioned a cave system at the Barns, which means this is new, and if the forest has the capability to flicker a giant cavern into existence, it has the power to flicker it right back out.

 

The fissure widens considerably within a few feet and its floor descends gradually, almost like stairs. Thin tendrils of light slip past the dense trees and illuminate just enough of the darkness to show Adam that it just keeps going deeper, and that there appears to be only one path. It’s only a few minutes before he’s engulfed completely in darkness, even though he’s sure he saw the forest and sky above him just seconds ago. Hopefully they’ll still be there when he returns. 

 

Adam walks for long enough that he begins to wonder if this cave isn’t magical after all, that it’s truly just a natural anomaly and he should turn around. Just when he stops, though, something flickers in the corner of his eye. A light. Faint, but there.

 

He follows it until he’s close enough to see that it’s coming from a chink in the uneven walls. Before he looks through it, though, he hears voices. Two voices, female and oddly familiar. 

 

Neeve and Piper.

 

Neeve and Piper are at the Barns?

 

“...know what’s wrong with it,” he hears Piper say. 

 

“It can’t fight back,” Neeve replies in a tone of voice that says _obviously, duh_. Adam really hates Neeve.

 

“Well, it is,” Piper hisses. “I don’t know what to tell you.”

 

Neeve huffs impatiently. “The only possible explanation I can come up with for why a _ley line_ would be _fighting you_ when you _control it_ , Piper, is that something’s on the inside, and it would have to be something with some semblance of power over either Cabeswater or the ley line. Do you know how likely that is?”

 

Piper scoffs. “Unlikely, apparently, but something’s happening, so I don’t know what to tell you.”

 

Ronan is inside Cabeswater.

 

Ronan is fighting back. 

 

The two women fall silent. There’s some scraping noises like they’re moving something around. Adam knows he shouldn’t look, but he can’t help it. He peers through the crack. It’s not big enough to reveal anything more than his eyes, which is a relief. With Neeve’s past with Adam, though, on top of her psychic abilities, she’d probably recognize him from his eyes alone. 

 

A silver basin sits on the ground, collecting water from the steadily dripping stalactites. Candles burnt down nearly to their bases line the edges of the circular cavern. Neeve and Piper are crouched over a second basin, this one filled with a dark, thick substance that Adam hopes isn’t blood. A gold necklace hangs from Piper’s delicate throat, so bright it’s almost glowing.

 

Piper herself looks like she’s aged since he last saw her. There’s less makeup on her face, revealing crow’s feet and lines around her mouth that come from a life of being entirely too serious. Whatever’s happening to her, it’s probably to do with her sacrifice, though Adam can’t imagine how giving up your beauty is anywhere near payment enough to take control of the ley line. 

 

Suddenly, Neeve turns around. Her narrowed eyes lock with Adam’s, but he moves away before she can even blink. He runs back the way he came, the cave floor surprisingly smooth. He runs until his chest is on fire and then runs some more, feeling abruptly claustrophobic in the pitch darkness. Eventually, he bursts out of the cave entrance, but he’s definitely not in the forest anymore. The cave entrance appears to be housed by a crumbling, roofless stone structure. A newer-looking door is set in the side of the stone room, but it doesn’t budge when Adam tries to open it. Seeing no other option, he thumps his fists on the door a few times and hopes this strange structure is close enough to civilisation for someone to hear him.

 

After a few minutes, heavy footsteps lumber toward him. A giant man leans down and puts his face in the tiny window on the door. 

 

“WHO’RE YOU?” The man shouts, though it’s not really shouting, he’s just talking very, very loudly. He looks oddly calm for someone who’s just had a stranger come out from the cave in their yard when said stranger did not go _into_ said cave. Adam would have expected a ‘what are you doing here’, but he’s not going to argue if the man doesn’t mind.

 

Adam replies, “My name is Adam Parrish, sir. I didn’t mean to trespass on your property. I got turned around in the cave, and I found the wrong way out, I guess.” 

 

The man shrugs. “NOT THE FIRST TIME IT’S HAPPENED, AND I RECKON IT’S NOT THE LAST.” He busies himself with unlocking the door. “NAME’S JESSE DITTLEY. DO YOU WANT TO USE MY PHONE? PEOPLE USUALLY DO.” 

 

Adam shakes his (frankly giant) hand. “That would be nice, thank you.” 

 

Mr. Dittley leads him down a hill, over a barbed wire fence, and through the back door of his house. He shows Adam a flip phone velcroed to the wall. He carefully removes the flip phone from its spot, like if he grabs it too hard he’ll break it. Adam supposes he might, what with his abnormal height and meaty hands. 

 

He dials Blue’s number automatically. She answers immediately. “Who is this?” She sounds frantic. 

 

“It’s Adam,” he replies. “I—”

 

“Adam!” She interrupts angrily. “You’ve been gone for hours! Where are you? Whose phone are you calling from?”

 

Adam frowns. He can’t have been gone for more than an hour and a half. “I’ll tell you everything soon. Can you come pick me up?”

 

She sighs. “Where are you?”

 

He holds the phone away from his face. “Sir, can you tell me your address?” Mr. Dittley booms his address and Adam repeats it back to Blue.

 

“How on Earth did you get there?”

 

“I have no idea.”

 

“We’re leaving now. Stay put, Adam.”

 

Blue hangs up. Adam learns that the Dittley Farm is cursed and that Mr. Dittley believes he’s destined to die soon. He hopes Mr. Dittley doesn’t make him deaf in his good ear, but it seems rude to ask him to quiet down when this appears to be his normal speaking voice. 

 

Blue hugs him when she arrives and thanks Mr. Dittley profusely. Adam explains what happened in the car where he’s seated with Cheng in the back seat. Gansey’s driving with Blue in the passenger’s side. 

 

“So the cave acts like Cabeswater,” Gansey surmises, “but Cabeswater is out of commission.”

 

Adam shrugs. “Mr. Dittley was talking about the cave. He thinks it’s cursed. According to him, the cave has been causing deaths in his family for generations, so if it was exactly like Cabeswater it would have moved or disappeared at some point, but it hasn’t.”

 

“I could accept a cursed cave, but connected to the Barns?” Blue shifts so she’s facing Adam in the back seat. “And how are Neeve and Piper there?”

 

“There must be other entrances,” Cheng adds. “We can assume they didn’t get in through the Barns, and I doubt it was through the farm.”

 

“If it’s possible for a way in to just _appear_ at the Barns, then it makes sense that entrances could spring up elsewhere,” Gansey agrees, drumming his fingers along the steering wheel. “Maybe Ronan dreamed it.”

 

Adam’s about to protest. Ronan would have _told_ him if he dreamed up an enchanted cave system, but maybe Ronan didn’t know. It had taken him a long time to realize he’d created Cabeswater, after all.

 

“Even if it’s not exactly like Cabeswater, it should still function like everything else at the Barns,” Blue says. “Like, if Opal and Matthew are sleeping, everything else should be too.”

 

“Well, Opal and Matthew and the forest are _alive_ ,” Gansey points out. “Maybe the cave works more like an object. It doesn’t need a… a life force, I guess, to keep it running.”

 

“It would take some sort of magic to get me from home to that farm, though,” Adam points out.

 

“Look, this is going nowhere, guys,” Blue interrupts. “For whatever reason, the cave is magic, but our ley line isn’t working. Maybe it’s on a different ley line? They have to intersect at some point, right?”

 

Gansey makes a quizzical noise. “I suppose that’s possible. We only know for certain where the one is, on the church and through Cabeswater.” He pauses thoughtfully. “Assuming the cave remains in place at the Barns, we have a way to get to Piper, and Ronan is in close proximity to Piper, right?”

 

Cheng snaps. “That’s it, Ganseyboy! It’s Piper.”

 

Gansey frowns. “What?”

 

Cheng waves his hand vaguely. “You’ve all been acting like the forest is completely dead to the world, but it’s not. _One_ person has access to it. Do you think it’s a coincidence Piper was in the cave with that slimy little accomplice of hers?” 

 

Gansey, like the fool he is, turns away from the road and stares at Cheng with unabashed attraction. “You genius!” He then glances up at Blue and Adam and promptly bursts into flame. Blue is staring resolutely at the road, which Adam notes with interest. 

 

“I wonder how Orla and Declan are faring,” Gansey asks to stifle the awkwardness, and Adam laughs more loudly than he has in a while. He hadn’t realized Declan intended on staying, and being alone with Orla Sargent is a more than appropriate punishment. Ronan would be overjoyed if he knew.

 

“I hope she hits on him so much he leaves,” Blue says through a peal of real, actual _giggles_. 

 

Adam snickers. “Declan would probably sleep with her and then ask not to tell Ashley once he kicks her out.” Blue smacks him, but it’s not malicious; they dissolve into a fit of laughter that Adam has needed for a long time.

 

 Back at the Barns, Declan is growling at someone over his phone and Orla is making a horrid-smelling tea. “Declan is so _stressed_ ,” she explains with a wicked grin. “I’m making just the thing.”

 

“It’s probably a love potion,” Blue scoffs, loud enough that Declan looks up. 

 

Gansey’s eyes widen. “Are those real?”

 

“Why don’t you find out?” Orla says saccharinely, making a _come hither_ motion. Blue pinches Gansey’s arm. “Love potions aren’t real, idiot.”

 

Orla pouts. “You never let me have any fun.”

 

Blue rolls her eyes. “You have too much fun already.”

 

Adam is not used to having so much free time, especially without Ronan around to annoy or Opal to play with. Blue is busy with Gansey and Cheng, with whom she seems to be enthralled, though she’d probably yell at him if he ever pointed that out. Because he is Adam Parrish, his first instinct is to try to come up with some catch-all solution to the messy situation he’s found himself in. It kills him that for the most part, they just have to keep going the way they’ve been the whole time: waiting until something hits them and then putting together another piece of the puzzle, though he’s not seeing any big picture.

 

Suddenly, Blue’s phone rings. “It’s Boyd’s,” she says, handing the phone to Adam. “Mom gave him my number for the BMW since your phone broke.”

 

Adam answers and brings the phone to his good ear. Boyd sounds unbelievably tense when he speaks. “Hey, Adam. Can you come into the shop? There’s something up with your boyfriend’s Beemer, and I figured you know it better’n I do.”

 

“Sure, I can come in later.” It makes sense that Boyd thinks the BMW is fucked up. Almost everything under the hood looks normal, except for the tiny little fact that it doesn’t need gas.

 

Boyd inhales sharply. “You better come now, son.” 

 

Boyd wouldn’t ask him to come in unless it was very important, right? “Okay, I’ll be there in half an hour.”

 

“Thanks, Adam.”

 

There’s an unfamiliar car parked at the garage, but that’s not unusual. Boyd had to have hired someone in Adam’s absence. The BMW’s in the shop, but Boyd is nowhere to be seen. Adam knocks on the door to his office. 

 

“Come on in, son.” Adam pushes the door open to find Colin Greenmantle holding a gun to Boyd’s jugular.

  
“When that Kavinsky kid got you instead of Ronan, I thought it was pure bad luck, but _you_ will lead him right to me, won’t you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comment, kudos, etc. Send me asks at beetlejeuse.tumblr.com.
> 
> Up next:
> 
> _Adam’s first thought is not again. His second thought is that he is most certainly going to die. Greenmantle wants Ronan, and Ronan is unreachable._
> 
> _“Let him go, I’m here now,” is all Adam decides to say, gesturing at Boyd._
> 
> _Greenmantle scoffs. “You tell me where Ronan Lynch is,” he says slowly, enunciating each word carefully like he’s talking to a child, “or I shoot both of you.”_


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Has it been a month since my last update? Yes. At this point abandon all hope at a regular updating schedule. I hope you'll forgive me, school's a bitch. Anyway, enjoy.
> 
> TW: Robert Parrish, homophobic language, both just in a memory.

Adam’s first thought is _not again_. His second thought is that he is most certainly going to die. Greenmantle wants Ronan, and Ronan is unreachable.

 

“Let him go, I’m here now,” is all Adam decides to say, gesturing at Boyd. 

 

Greenmantle scoffs. “You tell me where Ronan Lynch is,” he says slowly, enunciating each word carefully like he’s talking to a child, “or I shoot both of you.”

 

Adam huffs dramatically, like how he imagines an old rich man would after receiving bad service at a Applebee’s. He sighs only for Greenmantle’s benefit, because otherwise someone might notice the way he’s holding his hands to hide their shaking. “I don’t know where he is.”

 

“Bullshit.” Greenmantle raises his eyebrows. “Don’t try to lie to me. You die, or you let me talk to Ronan. It’s very simple, Adam.”

 

“I don’t know,” Adam snaps. “He’s gone.”

 

Greenmantle clicks the safety off of the gun. “I’ll ask you one more time.” 

 

“I told you, I don’t _know_ —”

 

 _Bang_. The door slams open. Greenmantle raises his gun, but someone shoves Adam to the ground. A gunshot rings out, but there’s no cries of pain so Adam’s pretty sure no one got hurt. He looks up to see Declan doing some impressive manoeuvre that ends with the gun flying across the now overcrowded office and Greenmantle pinned against the wall. Boyd, free of Greenmantle’s grip, pulls Adam outside.

 

“Adam, I know you’re a nice young man, but what have you gotten yourself into?” Boyd looks thoroughly shaken. His normally stoic demeanor has been reduced to something small and fearful.

 

Adam sighs. “That guy that came in, that was Ronan’s older brother.” He’s not sure how much he can reveal, so he settles for being as vague as possible. “He’s involved in some… stuff. Ronan and I get caught in the crosshairs sometimes.” 

 

Boyd narrows his eyes. “That boyfriend of yours, he’s not as much trouble as he looks, is he?”

 

Adam shakes his head vigorously. “No, we avoid his brother as much as possible.” He scoffs at the oversimplification of the situation. “I guess the BMW’s fine, then?” 

 

Boyd shrugs. “The lady that brought it in said not to touch it. Said you’d want to take care of it.” He pauses. “I was hoping she’d told you that and you’d know not to come. I’m sorry about this, son.” 

 

Adam sighs. “It’s not your fault.” He doesn’t add that he wasn’t lying, anyway: he doesn’t know where Ronan is. Suddenly, someone honks at them. It’s Blue, Orla, Gansey, and Cheng. Blue practically jumps out of the car as soon as they park and barrels into him. She winces at the strain on her burns, but it doesn’t stop her.

 

“Orla said she felt something off and she asked where you were and when I told her she said mom told Boyd to leave Ronan’s car alone so we came right away. Adam I was so _scared_ , you asshole!” She buries her face in Adam’s chest. “Declan left right away, he said he had to go alone, but we followed him anyway.” Adam hugs her close.

 

“Sorry for scaring you.” Gansey and Cheng reach Adam’s side. Adam avoids their gazes.

 

“It’s not your fault, idiot. Just stop getting kidnapped.” Blue steps back, but keeps her hands entangled with Adam’s. “What happened?”

 

He glances back at Boyd apprehensively. “I got to Boyd’s office and Greenmantle had a gun on him. He said if… if I didn’t tell him where Ronan was, he’d kill both of us.”

 

“That bastard.” She pauses, staring at the building behind them. “Is Declan still in there?”

 

Adam nods. He feels bad for leaving Declan alone in there, but Declan is probably best equipped out of any of them to deal with Greenmantle. He certainly doesn’t like Declan, and Ronan doesn’t either, but if Ronan came back to find Declan dead, he’s not sure what might happen. “He saved us.” He doesn’t say this reverently or gratefully or fearfully. He says it like a simple statement of a fact.

 

“I think I should go check on that boy,” Boyd says suddenly, shoulders set in determination. “He shouldn’t be alone in there.”

 

“ _No_ ,” Adam and Blue cry in unison. “You don’t want to get involved with him,” Adam explains. “Declan can handle him.” Right?

 

Boyd frowns. “He’s just a kid.”

 

Adam forgets, sometimes, that Declan’s only a year older than Ronan. His memories of both Ronan and Declan are split into two separate eras: before Niall, and after. Before Niall Lynch’s death, Ronan had been a different person. He doesn’t remember it all that well, seeing as Niall died in sophomore year and he and Ronan hadn’t been very close in the first two years of high school. Declan, though, barely seemed to notice his father’s death, at least on the outside. He was always the way he is now, though his iron grip on Ronan worsened considerably once he became in charge of Ronan’s life. It’s like he skipped adolescence. Adam supposes he wouldn’t have had much of a choice, if Niall was planning for Declan to follow in his footsteps. 

 

Before Adam can say anything else, though, a loud _bang_ rings out. Adam thinks of the gun. He follows Boyd back inside without thinking. 

 

Declan is propped up on Boyd’s desk, head tipped back and breath ragged. Blood wells from a wound in his thigh. “Come on, son,” Boyd grunts and props Declan up on one side. Adam takes the other side, and together they carry Declan outside into the back seat of Adam’s car.

 

Declan is unconscious by the time Adam starts his car. Cheng gets in the passenger seat without a word. Adam is grateful.

 

It’s a struggle to manoeuvre Declan into the hospital since Declan is dead weight now that he’s unconscious. The staff take him in immediately on a stretcher once they see Adam and Henry carrying him inside and usher them to the waiting room. 

 

“Orla dropped off Gansey and Blue at the Barns,” Cheng explains after a while. “Gansey doesn’t like hospitals.”

 

Adam shrugs. He wonders if they called Declan’s girlfriend. Why does he feel so… uprooted? Declan always seemed so untouchable. He knew that none of them were truly safe with both Greenmantles in Henrietta, but Declan got _shot_. For Adam. Adam _owes_ him. 

 

Cheng fiddles with his t-shirt. He usually wears more Ganseyish clothing when he’s in public, but he mustn’t have had time to change once they figured out Adam had fallen right into Greenmantle’s trap. “You hate Declan,” Cheng says neutrally, one perfect eyebrow raised inquisitively. 

 

Adam stares at the ceiling, straight up at the yellow fluorescent lights. “He’s...” _family_. That’s what’s bothering him, then. Adam has never felt the loyalty or sense of duty that apparently accompanies being part of a family, but despite his less than pleasant opinion of Declan Lynch, the thought of leaving him to wake up alone in Henrietta General makes him sick. “His girlfriend is in D.C.,” is all he settles on saying. A pause. “You can leave, if you want.” Adam does not want him to leave.

 

“I don’t like hospitals, either,” Adam admits. He has a long, long list of reasons to dislike hospitals, and each bullet point corresponds to a nasty scar. There’s another for his deaf ear, and another for Ronan: Ronan, sophomore year months after Niall’s death, following his father’s footsteps.

 

Adam had visited Ronan once while he was in the hospital. He’d given up a precious hour of homework between school and his shift at the factory because he’d heard Ronan was in the hospital. They let him in, but Adam barely got a glimpse of the bandages on Ronan’s wrist before Ronan kicked him out with a vicious snarl. He apologized for that nearly two years later, when they were going from Adam and Ronan to AdamandRonan. 

 

Why do his thoughts keep leading him back to Ronan?

 

“I’m glad you got out of there, Parrish,” Cheng says, and oh, right, hospitals. Cheng had always been more observant than Adam gave him credit for. 

 

Adam scowls. People being happy for him feels a little too close to being proud of him, and _that_ feels a little too close to taking credit. He says nothing. He doesn’t like thinking about his parents at the best of times, and especially not in a hospital. The night he left the trailer park ended in a visit to the hospital, but its beginning is what Adam prefers not to think about. 

 

Ronan dropped Adam off at home after a late shift, early senior year. He and Ronan had been subtle, secretive for this very purpose. Adam found his father outside waiting for him, empty bottle in his hand and alcohol on his breath. Adam can’t remember most of what he said– too busy being beaten halfway to death, and it would have been all the way, too, if Ronan hadn’t stepped in. That was the day Robert Parrish caught wind of the rumour that his son was a _queer_ . Adam remembers _that_ – _Did I raise a cocksucker, boy? Did I raise a_ fag _?_

 

Sometimes Adam’s scared that if he ever gets angry at his father, well and truly _angry_ , he’ll never stop.

 

Adam _hates_ hospitals. 

 

“Gansey texted me. He said they looked for Greenmantle with Boyd, but they couldn’t find him,” Cheng says, interrupting Adam’s spiralling thoughts. He’s grateful; his boxes are spilling into one another. He might vibrate out of his skin if he gets any more anxious. 

 

“I guess Declan will tell us when he wakes up.”

 

♕

 

Lying in the hospital bed, Declan looks a hundred years younger. He looks like a real twenty year old instead of someone who sprung out of the womb at age thirty five. 

 

“Parrish?” Declan rasps, blinking rapidly. “Why are you here.” Not a question; a demand. 

 

There are a million reasons Adam stayed: in the waiting room, the only thing that scared him more than why he was scared of Declan dying was Declan actually dying. He also owes Declan now, and maybe this is his way of starting to repay the debt. He snaps, “Someone needs to drive you back to the Barns, but I can go if you want.”

 

Declan sighs. If he were more awake and on less painkillers, Adam thinks he would have pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger like he usually does when Ronan says something particularly stupid. “It didn’t hit anything major. They called Ashley. She’s on her way to the Barns.” Only the facts: enough that Adam knows everything he needs to know, but he doesn’t know anything, not really. 

 

“Great,” Adam says awkwardly, and his resolve crumbles a little. He really doesn’t like Declan. He hates how Declan treats Ronan, and treats him by extension. Ronan, surely, would have left Declan alone, so why the fuck is he here? 

 

“Can you walk?” He asks finally, glancing at the thick white bandages wrapped around Declan’s thigh.

 

Declan rolls his eyes and points at the wheelchair folded up, leaning on the wall. Adam helps him into it with no lack of discomfiture. After Declan is checked out and in the shitbox, wheelchair returned to the hospital, Adam sighs. Henry’s in the back seat, staring intently out the window. 

 

“What happened to Greenmantle?” Adam asks eventually once they’re well on their way out of Henrietta. 

 

Declan grunts. “Some vines came out of the wall and dragged him into the floor. I figured it was something with your weird forest.”

 

It takes all Adam has to keep the car under control. “You couldn’t have mentioned that earlier?”

 

Declan scoffs. “I wonder what that’s like, people not telling you things,” he mutters bitterly, staring resolutely at the road ahead of them. 

 

Adam thinks it’s in bad taste to joke about Ronan when he’s possibly dying and definitely missing, so he barks, “Fuck off.”

 

Declan fiddles with the radio for a bit, but the first thing that comes on is some of Ronan’s ear-shattering electronica, so he turns it off.

 

They’re silent for the rest of the car ride. Adam could cut the tension with a knife. He doesn’t know how to act around Declan without Ronan as either a buffer or else another person on his side of the court. Declan’s just as uncomfortable with him, it’s clear in his every stiff movement and undisguised scowl. Adam wonders if it’s because he’s Adam Parrish, trailer trash or Adam Parrish, Ronan’s boyfriend. 

 

Adam and Cheng deposit Declan in the only guest room on the main floor. He falls asleep almost immediately, something for which Adam is immensely grateful. They find Gansey and Blue upstairs in Matthew’s room where Gansey and Cheng are staying, playing cards. Gansey grins at them and invites them to play, and Adam accepts, despite the nervous energy building in his chest. 

 

They play spoons for an hour, and blackjack for another. Gansey then insists on dragging everyone downstairs for some historical documentary that just came out, _it’s really very interesting, you know, it’s about—_

 

Eventually, the three musketeers retreat back to Declan’s room. Adam doesn’t care enough to think about what that means; he’s tired. He feels like he’s going to explode and spill his insides out on everyone in a thirty mile radius, like there’s something inside of him that’s too big to contain. Is this how Ronan used to feel? Does he still feel like this? 

 

Will he ever feel anything like this again?

 

Adam makes a decision. Or, it’s not really a decision. He realizes he’s going to do something, that he’s decided to do it without thinking about it. 

 

They’re running out of cranberry juice. He’ll have to get more next time he goes grocery shopping, he thinks as he pours it into a bowl. It’s almost too easy to lose himself in it with the mood he’s in, but he’s long gone by the time he thinks to worry about that. 

 

He ends up in Cabeswater, or some semblance of it. It resembles more the dark, dying Cabeswater of his visions than the one he remembers. He’s inside it but stuck immobile, though, like there’s a cage of glass between himself and everywhere else. He tries to move past it and immediately feels so dizzy he thinks he’ll throw up, but he can’t throw up, his body is somewhere far away. Is he dying? Is he trapped in the aether? _Or maybe you’re just having a bad trip_ , Ronan’s voice says in his head, or maybe he does hear it. 

 

 _Ronan_. He sees Ronan. Ronan is _there_ , sitting against a tree, waving some weird sword around haphazardly. He tries to cry out Ronan’s name, but nothing happens. He can’t see Ronan’s face, but he looks okay. Unhurt, at the very least. Ronan still doesn’t look up, but Adam hears a voice, distinctly feminine and distinctly furious. “Get _out_!” His mind says, _Piper_ . His mind says, _get out_. He can’t get out. 

 

Ronan glances up and stands up immediately. He looks exactly the same as the last time Adam saw him. His hair hasn’t grown at all, which shouldn’t be the first thing Adam thinks of. Ronan’s voice is muffled when he shouts, but Adam can make out the words: “Get the fuck out of here, motherfucker, you promised you wouldn’t—”

 

“ _BACK WHENCE YOU CAME_ ,” Piper screams in the way Cabeswater speaks, like there’s a hundred voices all piled on top of one another. Ronan moves toward him, but when he reaches toward Adam, Adam feels a gasp of pain. 

 

The feeling of slipping back into his body is unpleasant as usual, but this time it’s accompanied by a cacophony of voices that all quiet once they see him blink awake. 

 

Blue is crouched in front of him, glaring. There’s a bruise quickly forming on his forearm where she pinched him, presumably. Gansey and Cheng sit behind her. They must make a picture, the four of them crowded around a bowl of juice on the Barns’ kitchen floor. 

 

Most surprising is Ashley, Declan’s girlfriend. She’s sitting on the kitchen island, staring critically at Adam. Once they make eye contact, she raises an indifferent eyebrow and stands up to leave, probably to Declan’s guest room.

 

“Ashley came inside to find you _scrying_ ,” Blue says pointedly, rage clear in the set of her jaw, “without anyone here to ground you. I thought you said you wouldn’t do this. It was this whole fight, wasn’t it?” 

 

Adam glares. Says nothing. What is there to say? _I feel like I’m going to die if something doesn’t change. I’ve never been this kind of stressed before. I miss Ronan_. He _saw_ Ronan, was inches away from touching him when Blue woke him up. He’d been so close. 

 

“You talked,” Blue snaps after a moment too long of silence. “It was his voice. Piper’s too, I think.” Adam still doesn’t reply. He wants to upend the cranberry juice all over Blue. He wants to scream until his voice goes hoarse. He wants Ronan back. Blue takes a deep, calming breath, though her face becomes no less furious. “You can’t risk your life because you miss him, Adam Parrish. I’m your friend. I know you two are basically codependent, but I’m here too. I know you’d never throw away your life like that, but clearly _something_ ’s wrong. I can’t imagine how getting possessed would help you more than talking to your _friends_ , though.” She pokes him in the chest. “You’re not stupid, but you sure act like it sometimes.”

 

“Are you done lecturing me?” Adam asks, lips curled into a snarl. “I hadn’t realized you were the expert on all things psychic.” 

 

“Being sad isn’t an excuse to yell at me,” Blue retorts. “If you did find him, would you have even _tried_ to come back?”

 

“Fuck you. I did find him and I barely got one look at him before y’all woke me up, so thanks for that.” He winces at the _y’all_ and studiously avoids looking at Gansey and Cheng. “You yelled at them when _they_ thought I was so fucking pathetic I’d off myself because my boyfriend’s gone. What’s so different now, huh?”

 

“I don’t think you’re trying to do anything like _that_ , but you’re being Ronan-levels of self-destructive and I’m worried about you, okay? Come talk to me when you’re done being an asshole.” With that, Blue stands up and storms off, stomping loudly enough that her petite figure seems to take up the entire door frame as she leaves.

 

“I’ll go see if she wants a ride home,” Cheng says tersely, glancing between Adam and Gansey. 

 

Adam scowls at Gansey. “You gonna send me to my room?”

 

Gansey ignores this completely takes a deep breath. “Henry and I don’t have a real reason to be here anymore, since Greenmantle is in Henrietta. So I appreciate you not kicking us out. I can’t imagine leaving, not when we’ve come this far. I wouldn’t want to leave you like this.” He looks straight at Adam, maintains eye contact that Adam is trying to avoid. “You’re a good friend, Adam, and I’d like to return the favour. I know you don’t like to talk about Ronan, but I’m happy to talk to you about whatever you want.” He pats Adam on the arm in a way that would be awkward coming from anyone else and leaves Adam alone in the kitchen with the scrying bowl. 

 

Adam follows without thinking. The thought of being alone scares him more than talking to Gansey does. They end up on the porch swing on the veranda at the back of the house.

 

“I ordered some spelunking equipment to explore the caves,” Gansey informs him, and before Adam can even begin to unpack that Gansey adds, “I do hope they’re still there. I suppose we’ll always have an entrance at the Dittley farm, though I’d feel like an awful inconvenience bothering him so much.” 

 

Adam narrowly refrains from making a disparaging comment about Gansey’s wealth. “Did Declan ever tell you what happened to Greenmantle?” Gansey asks, staring out at the evening sky. 

 

“He said some vines came out of the ground and took him.”

 

“Piper?”

 

Adam nods. Gansey starts talking about some _fascinating text I read on North American ley lines, it talked about a ritual I believe Piper may have used to…_ Adam, surprisingly, is interested. Gansey’s meandering tangents are difficult to follow, but he’s glad to have anything close to a lead. (Or, that’s what he tells himself. It’s also kind of nice to listen to Gansey talk, eyes lit up as he gesticulates with excitement when he explains _the blood sacrifice, it’s really quite dangerous!_ )

 

“Am I boring you?” Gansey asks finally, and Adam realizes that Gansey hasn’t spoken for thirty seconds. 

 

“Not at all,” Adam answers honestly. “I think I’m going to go inside, though.” A heavy pause. “It’s been a long day.” 

 

Gansey nods and smiles at him, utterly genuine. The yellowish light bounces off his tousled hair in a way that can only be described as angelic. Adam momentarily feels so overcome with the gross, twisted feeling in his chest that he has to look away.

 

♕

 

“I feel so helpless,” Henry says, voice quiet and uncharacteristic. Blue doesn’t know if he’s talking about Adam or Cabeswater. 

 

“Me too,” she replies after a long pause. Henry is driving her home, something for which she is immensely grateful. She hates the Barns sometimes, though she’d never admit that to Ronan or Adam. 

 

Ronan’s childhood home is so completely filled with memories; the house is thick with them. The box of Niall and Aurora’s things taken out of the master bedroom that sits in Aurora’s old sickroom hangs more heavily in the air than the sticky Virginia humidity. Blue has no idea how Adam can handle being there without Ronan to act as a buffer between him and the mere _presence_ of the Barns: dreamers and dreamed, and dreamed and dreamed and dreamed. She’s certainly not one to be thrown by magic, and Adam isn’t either, but Niall Lynch’s shadow hangs over that house, made up of toasters with no wires and lights that run without electricity. 

 

As much as she wanted to get out of the Barns, she also didn’t want to be around Adam anymore. He’s without a doubt the smartest person she’s ever met, but he has an understandable yet frustrating blind spot when it comes to emotions. She trusts —trusted— that he’d never do anything to put himself in unnecessary danger, because he is pragmatic and rational above all else. She’s not even angry that he’s upset, and why would she be? Except, Ronan’s her best friend (after Adam, of course), and she’s worried about him, too. It keeps her up at night: the missing and the worry and the terror. How could Adam risk making her lose a second best friend?

 

She remembers the fight Adam and Ronan had, more than a week ago now, about Adam scrying. Everyone left the two of them alone in the kitchen, but Blue was shamelessly eavesdropping. Adam listened to _Ronan_ when he said that scrying was too dangerous, but she supposes that if Ronan were here to knock some sense into Adam, they wouldn’t be having this problem. She’s not mad that Adam won’t listen to her, exactly - well, she _is_ , but that’s not the point. She’s mad that Adam is driving himself crazy with stress and he’s barely noticing his own downward spiral. She’s mad that Adam, so hellbent on establishing himself as his own person, with or without Ronan, is losing it without his boyfriend. Of course, that’s unfair; Ronan’s not just gone, he’s _gone_ . Ronan’s disappearance might not be the sole reason for whatever’s going on with him, either, but she’ll never know if she doesn’t _tell him_. 

 

When they finally reach Henrietta, Henry asks, “What are your thoughts on gelato?”

 

“My thoughts are… generally positive,” Blue replies, raising an eyebrow. 

 

“Would you like some?”

 

“How could I say no to that?”

 

Blue has rarely been alone with Henry since his arrival. She’s been alone with Gansey and Henry and she’s been alone with Gansey, but almost never solely Henry. She worries about awkwardness, briefly, but Henry is probably incapable of being awkward anyway.

 

“How’s the burn, Bluebell?” Henry asks once they’ve acquired their gelato.

 

She shrugs with her uninjured shoulder. It still hurts. “Just peachy.”

 

“I would believe you were it not for your very obvious flinch.” Henry licks the gelato off of his spoon decadently. “I rather like you, wendybird.” 

 

Blue quirks an eyebrow and sticks her spoon into her cup of gelato decidedly. “Okay.” It’s unclear where this is going, but she’s not sure how she feels about it. Henry just stares at her, so she adds hesitantly, “I know we’re friends, Henry.”

 

He sighs. “Gansey likes you too, though he’s too much of a red-faced little cherub to ever admit that to me.” He runs a hand through his meticulous hair. “I don’t suppose you have any thoughts on that?”

 

Of course Blue has noticed Gansey looking at her, though she ignored it because of Gansey’s status as very, very taken. Blue hates - hated? - that Gansey would look at her like that despite his boyfriend, but never enough to say anything to him. After all, she could have been wrong about him (though she highly doubted _that_ ). If Blue noticed, then she should have realized Henry would, too. And it’s not like Blue hasn’t _noticed_ Gansey and Henry in the way they seem to be _noticing_ her, but it seems so… strange, all laid out in front of her like this.

 

“How presumptuous of you,” Blue says sharply, though she’s staring into Henry’s hair now, avoiding his eyes. 

 

“I was not assuming anything,” Henry responds. He chases her eyes with his own until they are locked staring at one another, gelato forgotten. “I simply asked your thoughts on the matter.”

 

Blue bites her lip. Gansey has an incurable case of foot-in-mouth disease and Henry is entirely too brazen. Unfortunately, both qualities are terribly endearing. Finally, she echoes, “My thoughts are… generally positive.”

 

Henry grins around a scoop of gelato. “Excellent,” he says, and it sounds like a great sigh of relief.

 

Blue finds, surprisingly, that she doesn’t feel suffocated by Henry’s assumption, no matter how much he tried to mask it as something else. She feels _known_ , which is weird because one: she’s known Henry for such a short amount of time he shouldn’t really know her at all, and two: she’s already known, by her mother and aunts and cousins and Adam and Ronan. 

 

She decides not to pick it apart; she’s happy, and no doubt has begun to set in yet. Why ruin it?

 

“What does Gansey think about this?” She asks, though she supposes Henry already answered that.

 

Henry shrugs, lazy and unapologetic. “I haven’t spoken to him about it yet.”

 

“You should have,” she accuses, stabbing her gelato. “You aren’t making a good case for yourself, you know.”

 

Henry grins again, equally lazy and equally unapologetic. “I know him. If I talked to him first, he might have worried about it for a few millennia before coming to any sort of conclusion.”

 

She frowns. “Well. Talk to him when you get home.” 

 

She thinks of the first time Gansey called Fox Way, the day Henry arrived in Henrietta. Adam and Ronan were fighting about something or other and Gansey was quietly nervous about everything (Blue has since come to learn that that’s just Gansey). She thinks of all the subsequent phone calls. She gave him her cell phone number after the second time Orla answered the phone and didn’t tell Blue Gansey called in favour of flirting with him. She thinks maybe she shouldn’t be thinking about whatever this is at a time like this, but then she thinks that she deserves to be happy too.

 

When Henry drops her off at home, he winks. “Excelsior, Bluegum.”

 

“Go away,” she hisses, doing a shitty job at stifling a smile. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comment, kudos, etc.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this chapter:
> 
> -Obligatory coca-cola t-shirt reference  
> -Spot the biblical reference! (Other than Adam's whole character I suppose)  
> -If you're on desktop, hover over the Latin words for translation. If you're on mobile, check the end notes. (Re: Latin translations, I used a mix of excessive research and google translate, please forgive me if you speak Latin and my phrases are incorrect.)

“Get the fuck out of here, motherfucker, you promised you wouldn’t scry!” Ronan shouts at Adam’s flickering figure, but his last few words are cut off by some roaring that might be words, but it’s all too much for Ronan to decipher. Ronan reaches out for Adam, but he disappears before they touch.

 

“Mother _fucker_!” Ronan screams at the top of his lungs. Some of the few remaining leaves on the surrounding trees wilt, though that may be because of the degradation of Cabeswater at an exponential rate and not Ronan’s fearsome shouting. 

 

Ronan is fucking tired of being in Cabeswater. Real life Cabeswater had not been infinite. Well, they never reached another edge of it, but it wouldn’t make any sense for the forest to have no end. Dream-Cabeswater, however, seems to be some ceaseless monstrosity created for the express purpose of torturing its only inhabitant. 

 

Without anything else to do, Ronan just walks around, usually. In his dreams, he’d go swimming in the crystal-clear ponds or climb dizzyingly tall trees, but all the nice parts of the forest are dead, decaying, and full of that black slime. He’s been searching for the end, despite the apparent lack of one. Now, though, he’s taking a break because Adam is an idiot and Ronan hates him.

 

Ronan is furious  at Adam. He swore he wouldn’t scry, but then he went and put himself in terrible danger by scrying, except Ronan’s anger is mostly deflated by his relief at seeing that Adam’s _alive_. If Adam’s alive, it probably means they survived Kavinsky. Adam also looked mostly the same, save for the bags under his eyes that looked more like bruises. It’s been a long time since Ronan saw him looking that exhausted, and he’s less than happy for that Adam to be back. What’s happening in the outside world that has Adam so stressed? Is he okay without Ronan? Is he okay in general? Has Declan come to harass him about Ronan’s whereabouts? Would Adam beat up Declan for harassing him? (He wouldn’t, but he should.) 

 

Ronan starts walking again, because there’s no other way to work off his energy in this godforsaken place. He’s so preoccupied with _AdamAdamAdam_ that he nearly walks into a lake of sludge. He almost drops his wooden sword into it, too, so he curses up a storm as he backs away from the black stuff. His sword, though made of wood, has not met anything that can break it so far. It leaves slashes in the trees and cleaves boulders in two and hasn’t yet acquired a scratch on it. He has a feeling it’ll come in handy, sooner or later.

 

He hasn’t tried to dream anything else up after the sword. The bonds crushing Cabeswater into its cage are stronger now since last time, and he’s not sure if there’s any juice left for him to dream something in the first place. He doesn’t want to dream a nightmare, either, because _that_ would be a disaster and a half. If he dies in this Cabeswater, does he die for real? Ronan’s not exactly keen on finding out.

 

Occasionally, he stumbles across some odds and ends in the forest he remembers finding in the real Cabeswater: the shitbox’s steering wheel, one of Opal’s skullcaps, a pile of Coca-Cola t-shirts. He’s not sure what that means. The t-shirts didn’t even smell like Adam, so what’s the point?

 

If Adam were here, he’d try and look at it scientifically. All of his stupid college education would probably come in handy right now, but Ronan will have to make do. He remembers bits and pieces from Adam’s long, late-night rambles about things he’s learned in class. Between Adam’s pseudo-lessons and stuff he’s learned from watching too many bad science fiction movies, he assumes this Cabeswater acts like some kind of pocket universe or dimension or something. He’s fuzzy on the details, okay?

 

He remembers one specific phone call from Adam very well, about the size of the universe. (He remembers it because Adam was tired and his voice was all raspy and it was unbearably sexy. Maybe he’d have paid attention at Aglionby if Adam taught him everything while sounding like _that_ .) Adam said there’s no real way of knowing the size of the universe because there’s no way of knowing if it’s flat or curved. If it’s curved one way, like the Earth, you could travel for ages in one direction and eventually end up where you started. Adam had described something else, too, about it being curved inversely, ‘like a saddle’ or something, but that one hadn’t made much sense. It could also be flat, though Adam had seemed to think that was boring. The universe could be infinite, so full of possibilities that anything and everything would be happening all at once. Ronan hopes his little universe is finite, because the banality that Cabeswater is starting to take on is kind of annoying. He wants to see the _end_ , because at this point anything different would be exciting. A magical, time-bending forest is only really interesting if you don’t have to stare at said forest every hour of every day and deal with its mood swings and arbitrary changes in season. 

 

“Speak of the devil,” Ronan mutters to himself as a torrent of snow starts to fall, thick flakes sapping him of the usual warmth that permeates Cabeswater. He takes cover under a tree that still has at least half of its leaves and wills with all his might for the storm to pass as quickly as it came. The forest is usually happy to bend to the Greywaren’s will, but the snow shows no signs of slowing. 

 

The snow builds up thicker than he’s ever seen in Virginia, even in the Barns, where the weather was always a little more intense. He’s fucking freezing. The snow has soaked through his pants and his leather jacket is in a losing battle against the frigid air. He should walk around to warm up, but he’s so tired and trudging through snow this high isn’t exactly at the top of his to-do list. He remembers Adam or Gansey or someone telling him, once, how dangerous the cold is, but he didn’t listen. When would he have been stranded in sub-zero temperatures then, anyway?

 

Eventually, he drifts off, falling into the quasi-sleep state that’s the closest thing to rest Cabeswater lets him experience. It could be from exhaustion or his significantly lowered body temperature or all of the above. He doesn’t much care; if he’s going to die here, it won’t be from frostbite. 

 

It’s an odd feeling, dreaming within a dreamworld. He supposes it’s not really a dreamworld, even though it started out that way. He feels definitively _awake_ there, like it’s caught halfway between the real world and whatever else there is. It’s strange, mostly, to go to sleep and find himself dreaming in almost the exact place he went to sleep in. 

 

“Hey,” someone says, familiar but wrong. Ronan looks around to find dream-Adam standing a while away, half-hidden behind a dying tree. A viscous stream of sludge is dangerously close to his hand, so Ronan snaps, “Get away from that shit.”

 

Adam doesn’t move. Ronan hates and loves looking at this Adam in equal measure. On the one hand, it’s _Adam_ , but on the other, he’s off: his hair is the wrong shade of dusty brown and the veins on his hands are barely visible. He remembers the days when he told himself that this Adam was the most he’d ever get, before Adam was _his_. He doesn’t like it. 

 

Adam moves closer. A river of the black stuff has appeared between them, but Adam doesn’t stop walking. 

 

“Stay away from it, idiot, do you have a fucking death wish?” Ronan hisses, looking around desperately for something to use as a bridge. He comes up empty: the forest floor is conveniently barren. Adam shows no sign of stopping, even as he nears the edge. The river runs quickly, despite the molasses-like nature of its contents; if he were to step into it, he’d be swept away.

 

Adam pauses before stepping into the dark current. Surprisingly, he doesn’t fall in. Instead, he walks _on_ the river. 

 

“Jesus Mary,” Ronan whispers reverently.

 

The moment his foot his the sludge, though, Adam’s eyes go black, like a fucking B-list horror movie demon. The farther he walks, the worse it gets: another step and his nose and mouth are morphing grotesquely into a beak. Another, and his arms twist at horrible angles and feathers fight their way out of his skin until he has greasy black wings that end in freakish claws. The sound of Adam’s bones breaking as they’re forced into horrible, unnatural shapes makes Ronan retch. He wants to run, but he’s frozen in place. Adam might still be in there. 

 

Eventually, the last trace of Adam disappears and a nightmare creature stands in his place. He reaches the bank of the black river closest to Ronan, and once he’s set foot on land, his gaze zeroes in on his target. Ronan wishes he had his sword with him, but this dream isn’t very generous; the only thing he can do is run. The strategy works for a few minutes, but the tree roots start to get so thick and tangled it’s impossible to run without tripping. 

 

Ronan turns to face the monster. It’s —he’s?— closer than he thought. Its claws graze Ronan’s side and he stumbles backwards, but his foot catches on a stray root and he topples to the ground with a painful _thud_. He scrambles back, but the creature has the advantage. It picks him up like a ragdoll, and—

 

Cabeswater pulls him out of the dream or whatever the hell it is. Last time, when he dreamt up the sword, the forest had done the same thing, though he wanted to wake up then. Now, Ronan might have to deal with a fucking monster in the forest he can’t escape.

 

He blinks a few times. The snow has melted, but now it’s so hot Ronan shucks his jacket, idly wondering if Cabeswater will protect him from sunburns. The shallow scratches from his dream are dripping blood, but that’s the least of his worries right now. He can’t _hear_ the creature, but it could be _anywhere_. 

 

He picks up his sword and wanders around for a few minutes. It seems to be safe, but he’s suspicious; if he brought back the wounds from his dream, then why didn’t the creature itself follow? It doesn’t follow Ronan’s dream-logic. 

 

His answer comes in the form of a low growl. He whirls around, sword brandished, to see the monster loping toward him at an alarming speed. He realizes very suddenly that the weight in his sword-carrying hand has lessened considerably; he tears his gaze away from the oncoming predator to see that the wooden sword is quickly dissolving into black goop. He drops it before the stuff can reach his hand and grabs a branch off of the ground, as good a weapon as he’s going to get now. 

 

The monster knocks Ronan to the ground on impact. He doesn’t have time to catch his breath before it lifts him up into the air and pins him against a (thankfully sludge-free) tree. All he can do is brace himself when the creature raises a gnarled claw, ready to strike, but it never comes. Ronan cracks his eyes open to see black liquid spilling from its eyes, so dark its feathers look gray in comparison. Ronan shoves it off of him and stands a safe distance away while the night horror slowly melts to nothing more than a pool of goop.

 

“What the _fuck_ ,” he whispers, unable to look away from the puddle that was, just moments ago, a living thing. Well, arguably. Semantics. 

 

So far, only Ronan’s dream creations have dissolved like that. The trees, at least, are dying slow, painful deaths. Ronan himself is, though in a notably different way from his surroundings, a dream thing, which begs the question: will he melt into nothingness, too? How long does he have before Cabeswater runs out of juice and there’s nothing left?

 

Ronan decides to put off pondering his own mortality in favour of walking around aimlessly some more. It’s been getting more and more difficult to avoid the black stuff. He has to watch his every step. It’s a modern miracle, really, that he’s gone this long without touching it. His curiosity tempts him to get it over with and see what’ll happen, but the dread in the pit of his stomach says he should put it off as long as possible. Ronan Lynch is not one to succumb to cowardice in the face of fear, but this is different. He wants to survive this ordeal, after all. He won’t ever see his family again if he dies because he’s a dumbass.

 

Every so often, the forest keens discordantly and suddenly ups the production of the stupid goddamn slime, which is starting to smell in the heat. Ronan finds this positively unfair. What’s it even made of, anyway? What biological matter or whatever the fuck is in this stupid dream poison that’s making it _smell_? (Adam could probably figure it out.) 

 

Abruptly, the trees fall away. Or, that’s what it looks like; a moment ago, there was a forest stretching out before Ronan as far as he could see, and the next, it was gone, replaced by a ceaseless field of _nothing_. It hurts his brain to look at; he can’t pin down exactly what it is. It’s not any certain colour, nor are there any specific shapes or figures in the fog. It’s just _nothing_.

 

It would appear, Ronan thinks, that he has reached The End. 

 

Because he’s not _that_ stupid, he doesn’t try to stick his hand out into the void for fear of his atoms being torn apart or something. Instead, he goes back into the forest to find something he can hurl into the nullity. As soon as he steps back into the trees, it disappears. The forest once again looks as endless as the void had not a second before. That’s fucking stupid; Cabeswater should put up a sign or something. _Caution, mind-melting abyss ahead_. 

 

After finding a sizable rock, Ronan approaches the edge. It hurts as much to look at as it did the first time; no matter how long he stares out into it, it doesn’t get any clearer. It’s like trying to look at something that doesn’t exist, which he is, he supposes. He lobs the rock into it, and—

 

Nothing. Once it passes the invisible line between Cabeswater and the void, it just… disappears.

 

Ronan was hoping for at least an explosion. 

 

Suddenly, a grinding screech sounds; by now, Ronan knows this means that Piper is doing something or other and Cabeswater is about to undergo some unfortunate… he’s not sure what to call it, actually, when the trees become so full of the black stuff that they just melt and cease to exist, like they’ve been taken apart at their very core. Whatever the opposite of creation is; not quite destruction. Something more insidious. Like the forest is being _un_ made. 

 

He spots an oak a few feet away from him dripping black stuff, so he makes himself scarce in search of a less densely wooded area. Luckily, this has been much easier lately, what with the rapidly dying trees. That, of course, is possibly the only pro to the trees dying, but Ronan will take what he can get. 

 

He takes shelter in a thicket that appears to be less dead than everywhere else, though that doesn’t mean much. Save for a few close calls, he survives Cabeswater’s temper tantrum. Once he’s certain it’s over and there’ll be no more surprise sludge attacks, he emerges from his copse, only to find himself at the edge of Cabeswater once again. He _knows_ that it wasn’t this close before; he’d moved a fair distance to take cover in the pseudo-storm. 

 

It can only mean one thing: Cabeswater is shrinking. 

 

It’s probably only when Piper uses it, or else the brink would still be receding, right? 

 

From this, Ronan can conclude that: one, Cabeswater is a finite resource, and two, if he’s stuck in here too long, he’ll die along with everything else.

  
  


 

 

Ronan begins to regret losing his jacket when the temperature starts to drop. He hopes, at least, that the snow stays away, at least until Cabeswater manifests some of Adam’s clothes again or he runs into his own, though the latter is looking less and less likely the more he searches. Eventually, he comes upon a glade he recognizes instantly: a perfectly circular clearing ringed by ancient, hulking oaks. They even have the scratches from his tussle with the night horror. It’s uncanny.

 

Did Cabeswater recreate it for him, or is he in some kind of dream-version of the real thing? He’s pretty sure Cabeswater doesn’t have the power to create a new sector of the forest, but that leaves him with more questions than answers. Cabeswater could have created this before everything went to shit, but that leaves only a narrow margin. He’d never seen the clearing before Opal showed it to him, which happened on the same day as Cabeswater’s first disturbance, and Piper was probably already messing with the ley line by then anyway, so what the hell is a piece of the Barns doing in nightmare-Cabeswater?

 

Maybe it’s a door, or something like that. Maybe he could use this clearing to get home, or at the very least communicate with Adam or something. Ronan refuses to believe it’s just a coincidence that the glade is here. He’s not sure how long he’s been stuck here, but if he goes for much longer without any hope of escaping, he might lose it, so he plants himself in the clearing and resolves to stay unless it kills him.

 

Boredom sets in quickly; the monotony is what kills him most of all. Sure, the forest is shrinking and sure, he just got attacked by a nightmare creature that used to be sort-of-Adam, but he’s been here for ages, and mostly he just walks around. What he wouldn’t do for even the ability to take a nap without near-fatal consequences. 

 

He remembers once, near the beginning of Adam’s senior year in the early stages of their relationship, Adam had made Cabeswater boom along to the baseline of one of Ronan’s ‘white noise machine recordings’ (Adam’s words, not his). Ronan had found it unbearably endearing and expressed that by snarling at Adam and then making out with him furiously against a tree. He wishes he could have that back: either Adam or the music. He’d take any reprieve from being completely alone in a forest full of death with only the rattling of the branches to keep him company. 

 

Eventually, it starts to rain. It’s fucking _cold_ , though nowhere nearly as bad as it was when he passed out from hypothermia or whatever the fuck happened earlier. The heat has almost completely dissipated. Ronan Lynch, vociferous proponent against any temperature above sixty five degrees, does _not_ want the vicious heat back, but he will admit it wouldn’t be horrible. He wishes Cabeswater could still bend to his will; when they visited Cabeswater with Gansey, the dreary rainfall had stopped as soon as someone complained about it. Then, of course, Cabeswater had been able to control itself. Now, the forest is at the mercy of its own whims just as much as Ronan is. 

 

“ _MALA TEMPORA CURRUNT_ ,” the forest screams suddenly, which isn’t threatening at all. “ _APAGE, GREYWAREN, APAGE_.”

 

“Don’t I fucking know it! You think I’m here because I want to be? Also, can you stop the goddamn rain? It’s fucking freezing.” He was sure Cabeswater couldn’t talk anymore, but he doesn’t feel like analyzing it. He’s done enough thinking for a lifetime. 

 

“ _PAENITET, GREYWAREN_.”

 

“Fuck off.” 

 

The rain doesn’t stop.

 

He feels… angry that he’s stuck here, but beneath that, abject misery. It’s cold and lonely and everyone he loves could very well be dead by now, killed by Piper or her stupid fucking husband or maybe so much time has passed since Adam appeared that they’ve all forgotten him or died. It’s like he’s stuck on a deserted island in the middle of the ocean. Except, the island is going to die before Ronan, and all he can do is hang on for the ride. (He’s never been good with metaphors, okay?)

 

He lets his head fall back so he’s staring at the murky gray sky. Unless Adam miraculously figures out how to rescue Ronan from this sludge-breathing dragon, he’s going to die.

 

♕

 

“Stop it with this bullshit, Piper,” Neeve hisses. She’s _fed up_. She started helping Piper with the intention to take over her shoddy operation when things went to shit, but Piper’s hanging on for dear life, despite her declining health and the problems she keeps running into that are building exponentially. 

 

First of all, Piper looks like a strong gust of wind would knock her over. Neeve doesn’t know _what_ she sacrificed to do whatever it is she’s aiming for, but she looks like she’s aged twenty years since Neeve met her. Secondly, she kidnapped her ex-husband and has him tied up. For no reason other than he was annoying her, apparently. 

 

“We can’t have him stirring up old gossip over the ley line _now_ ,” Piper points out. 

 

“You shouldn’t bring more people into this at a time like this,” Neeve retorts, which leads to her third point: Piper can’t see why the ley line fighting back against her is such a problem. The ritual she performed didn’t have any loopholes; it’s not like the ley line could have just opted out. 

 

“Besides, he can help us.” Piper turns to her husband with a grin that stretches her unnaturally wrinkled face unpleasantly. “Can’t you, pumpkin? You know all about Henrietta.” 

 

Colin Greenmantle scowls. The vines pinning him to the wall of the cave tighten. He still says nothing. 

 

“That boy, the one that saw us here. It reacted to him.” Piper turns to Neeve and cocks her head. “You knew who he was.”

 

Of course Neeve knows who Adam Parrish is. He stole the awakening of the ley line right out of her hands. How could she forget? She hadn’t told Piper about that, though. She tells Piper exactly what she needs to know and nothing more. 

 

“One of my niece’s friends,” is all Neeve says. A lie, as far as she knows. Blue hadn’t had any friends while Neeve lived at Fox Way, before she got lost between the mirrors. “Adam Parrish.”

 

Piper rolls her eyes. “You know why he was here.” She sounds horribly put-upon. 

 

“I might.” Neeve echoes Piper’s condescending tone. She is, in fact, worried about why on Earth Adam Parrish is messing with Piper Greenmantle. If he finished the ritual, then he must know that something’s going on with the ley line. He also shouldn’t have any sort of power over the ley line, not anymore, so it’s not him that’s screwing with Cabeswater. 

 

It could be his irritating friend, she supposes; Neeve rarely saw Parrish in the forest without Ronan Lynch. She remembers specifically being overwhelmed by Lynch’s energy. There’s something undeniably magic about him, something chaotically _creative_ in the purest sense of the word, though she never quite figured it out. 

 

“Be that way,” Piper says airily, waving her hand in a vague, dismissive gesture. “You’ll tell me sooner or later.” 

 

Neeve frowns. She knows what threats sound like. Instead of responding, she busies herself with adjusting the scrying bowl.

 

“You could see what’s wrong with the ley line by scrying,” Piper points out, undeterred by Neeve’s silence. 

 

Neeve sighs. “Maybe.” She could, hypothetically. She doesn’t particularly _want_ to, though, not without anyone trustworthy to ground her and especially not with the unpredictable nature of Piper and therefore the ley line. 

 

Piper turns her piercing gaze onto her (ex-?) husband, about whom Neeve had honestly forgotten. “What do _you_ know about Adam Parrish?”

 

Colin Greenmantle rolls his eyes. “You know what I want.”

 

The leafy vines creep around Colin’s throat. “What you want is irrelevant, dearest.”

 

Colin stays silent for as long as he can, but relents once he loses the ability to breathe. Men are so _weak_ . “I only know that he’s dating Ronan Lynch,” Colin croaks. “I hope that’s _helpful_ to you, darling.”

 

The name _Ronan Lynch_ means nothing to Piper, but not to Neeve. Greenmantle’s clearly only interested in Parrish for his proximity to Lynch, and the only reason Greenmantle would be interested in Lynch is if Lynch is somehow related to the mysterious Greywaren that Piper (frequently and irritatingly) complained about taking up her husband’s attention. Neeve also knows that Piper is lording something about the Greywaren over Colin’s head. What neither Greenmantle knows, though, is that Ronan Lynch has some sort of magic about him. If Neeve could just get Piper to tell her what she knows, she might solve this puzzle. 

 

“Actually, Piper, I think you may be right,” Neeve says casually. “Scrying could work. There’s just something I’d like to know first.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Latin translations:
> 
> \- "Mala tempora currunt": Bad times are upon us  
> \- "Apage": Get out, get away, begone, etc etc  
> \- "Paenitet": Sorry
> 
> Comment, kudos, etc.
> 
> I have a confession for you all: I have hit some writer's block with this fic. I originally intended for all of it to be out and published before CDTH, but I'm still not quite finished the last few chapters. I'm almost there, but not all the way, so updates will be a little slower (as if they aren't already slow lmao) while I try to balance writing and school. I hope you all understand! Thank you for all of your comments and support, ily all.


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Has it been 2 months? Perhaps.
> 
> Now that CDTH is out, I would like to remind you all of this was written moons before CDTH's release date was even announced, so it is not compliant to CDTH in the least.

Adam can’t sleep.

 

He’s sprawled out on the king-sized mattress, staring up at the empty ceiling. He thinks that’s allowed, considering the circumstances, to be wide awake in the early hours of the morning for no reason, but it’s such a foreign feeling. Out of necessity, he’s always been able to fall asleep as soon as his head hits the pillow. 

 

Sleeping is harder without Ronan, though. It’s not just that he’s not _here;_ he survived a year at college without his boyfriend. The problem is that Adam is in Ronan’s room alone when Ronan should be with him.

 

It’s still hard to think of this as Ronan’s room _(his_ room), sometimes. It was only during Adam’s second semester away that they moved into the master bedroom. Ronan had practically begged Adam to come home for a weekend, which was odd enough. When he arrived, Ronan, loosely holding a bottle of whiskey, announced, “We’re clearing out my parents’ room.”

 

The walls are still sparse, but it’s _theirs;_ Ronan’s clothes are messily stuffed into the wardrobe, Adam’s tucked and folded more neatly. Odd dream things litter Ronan’s nightstand, along with Opal’s hair clips (courtesy of Blue) and pile of leather wristbands and a never-used alarm clock. Adam’s side is nearly empty (which is to be expected, really), but it makes Ronan’s absence all the more apparent.

 

There’s a noise, so quiet Adam thinks he might have imagined it, until it comes again: a light knock on the door.

 

“Come in,” he replies warily. The only possibility, really, is Gansey, but a pang of fear still makes itself known. 

 

Sure enough, the door creaks open and Gansey slips through, dressed in the silky kind of pajamas that Adam imagines old men in black and white movies would wear. Adam turns on the bedside lamp and beckons Gansey over. 

 

“Sorry if I woke you,” Gansey whispers. His eyes look a little manic: red-rimmed and too wide for this time of night. 

 

“I was already awake.”

 

Gansey frowns. “Are you alright? You usually sleep well.”

 

It endears Adam that Gansey has noticed something like that, and not only that but he’s _worried_. Still. “What did you want?”

 

Gansey shakes his head. “Yes, you’re right, sorry. Yes. I was reading an old text of mine, it was about Welsh history. That’s what I’m doing my thesis on, Owen Glendower, so I have quite a lot on Welsh kings.” Adam wonders if he notices how much he gesticulates when he talks. “Anyway, I was reading this old text because I remembered something I’d read a long time ago. It hadn’t had any relevance to my interests at the time, of course, but now it’s– anyway! It talks spells and rituals and things about realizing your dreams. I suppose it meant that in the figurative sense, but with some tweaking, it could work.”

 

“What could work?” Gansey’s left out chunks of what he’s trying to explain, but Adam understands. It’s quite another thing to let himself believe it, though; it seems like too much to hope for.

 

Gansey grins infectiously. “Bringing dreams to life. The Greywaren abilities.” 

 

“There’s only one Greywaren,” Adam snaps automatically. Dream thieves don’t count. “Are you certain?” 

 

Gansey opens and closes his mouth a few times, like he’s going to say something but changes his mind. “I’m not yet clear on what the ritual entails, and I’m sure it’s been tried before, but I believe there’s hope. It’s you, after all.” And Gansey says his last sentence so simply, like it’s a universal truth. _It’s_ you _, after all_. Like Adam is something important.

 

“I’ll do anything.” He doesn’t mean to be quite that honest, but it was probably written on his face before anyway. “Thanks, Gansey.”

 

Gansey smiles. “It’s nothing at all. I’ll talk to Maura and the others soon, get their thoughts on it, but I think it’ll work.”

  
  
  
  
  
  


“Absolutely _not_ ,” Calla all but roars, glaring daggers at Gansey. “I’m well-fucking-aware you usually do whatever you want with or without our approval, but you’re messing with dark, dark magic.”

 

Adam is sitting in the living room with Persephone while she paints her nails elaborately. He’s not sure exactly why he’s been summoned for this, but it offers a convenient opportunity to eavesdrop on Calla’s verbal decimation of Gansey. He cranes his neck so he can see into the kitchen where they’re gathered.

 

Calla’s eyes sharpen further, somehow. Gansey shrinks away from her as much as he physically can. “You must have known how dangerous it is, and you still went ahead and told him?” She gestures at Adam. “You knew he’d want to do it, no matter the consequences.”

 

“He didn’t know it was that dangerous,” Cheng cuts in.

 

Gansey sighs. “I wanted to help.”

 

Calla scowls. “Idiot.”

 

Blue speaks up, but her voice is too low for him to make out. He turns his good ear toward the kitchen and strains to listen. They’re talking about him, after all. “...been messed up since Friday,” Blue is saying. “What if there’s no other way to get him back?”

 

“Of course he’s messed up, he’s grieving. Maura was _messed up_ over Butternut and _he’s_ gone, but she’s still here,” Calla points out.

 

“Don’t bring me into this,” Maura snaps.

 

“Oh, so you think they should do it?” Calla hisses.

 

“I never said that!”

 

“So you want to leave Ronan in there forever?” Blue demands. 

 

“Don’t you put words in my mouth, Blue Sargent, I—”

 

Adam can’t take it anymore. He storms through the kitchen and up the stairs to Blue’s room. He’s not sure if he’s entirely welcome here after their fight, but he’d rather endure Blue’s wrath than hear another word of the others’ argument. If he were more uninhibited and less Adam Parrish, he might have driven off in the shitbox or thrown a tantrum in the kitchen. Instead, he sits on the floor in front of Blue’s bed and stares at the hodgepodge on the walls, familiar as the back of his hand. Some things have changed since Adam’s last visit, but it’s nearly imperceptible; a cardboard tree refurbished here and a confusing, abstract drawing coloured in there. 

 

After an indeterminate amount of time, Blue sits beside him. She doesn’t speak in favour of scowling at the walls. Adam tries to think of something meaningful to say that won’t ignite the kindling in his chest, but comes up blank. Finally, he mutters, “Thanks.” 

 

Blue huffs. “That’s it?” She gives him an icy glare. 

 

“I don’t know what you want me to say, Blue,” he growls but no, that’s not quite true. He wrings his hands together anxiously. “I don’t want to fight again,” he finally decides on. 

 

Blue raises an unimpressed eyebrow. “That’s nice.”

 

Adam scoffs. He goes back to staring blankly at the walls until Blue slowly says, “I _know_ you want to talk to Ronan. But he’s not here.”

 

This statement, for reasons unknown, silences Adam. It’s two simple facts: Adam wants Ronan. Ronan isn’t here. Logically, Adam knew these things; all too well, really. But they hadn’t penetrated his the fog clouding his usual state of mind since Ronan disappeared. Adam wants Ronan and Ronan is gone and Adam is alone. 

 

Except, he’s not alone. 

 

“Everything is wrong,” he blurts out, which makes no sense. He feels unmoored, utterly and completely. Like his seams have been neatly snipped open and his insides are spilling out. “It’s all fucked up. I’m fucked up.”

 

Blue gives him an appraising look; not pitiful or harsh. “Why.” Her deliberate lack of intonation sparks something in Adam’s stomach: anger or frustration or misery. 

 

“I’m supposed to be able to be okay without him. I hate feeling like I’m too goddamn clingy and codependent.” He scoffs. “Maura was messed up over Butternut and _he’s_ gone, and she’s still here,” he echoes bitterly, staring anywhere but at Blue. “I’m supposed to be in control but I’m _not_ . I couldn’t find a way to get him back. Gansey did that, but we’re not _allowed_ to do it. And I feel fucking stupid for wanting it so badly.” He runs a hand through his hair and sighs. “I feel like shit and I don’t know how to fix everything that’s happened and I’m _sad_ because he could be _dead,_ Blue. I don’t let myself think we might not get him back. I think I’d go insane.”

 

Blue says nothing, just leans on him and tips her head onto his shoulder. 

 

“I’m sorry I scared you,” he whispers, leaning his head on Blue’s. “I wasn’t trying to. I just don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to do.”

 

Blue sits up and turns so she’s facing him. “You can be sad, Adam. You don’t have to hold it together for whatever reason you’re thinking.” She tangles her fingers with his. “I need you to get that. You don’t have to save the world. You just have to save you.”

 

Adam’s eyes burn. It’s remarkably similar to what Calla told him the day after Ronan disappeared. He hadn’t thought it about it much then. _You don’t have to carry this all on your own, Atlas._

 

“I’m sad and frustrated and I miss him and I’m worried and I’m so fucking _mad_ that he just up and left me.” He removes his hands from Blue’s in favour of balling them into fists so hard his knuckles whiten.

 

“I can’t magically bring him back, but you can’t keep all that bottled up, Adam. We don’t care if you’re not perfect. We care if you’re okay.” 

 

“Well,” Adam bites out, “I’m not.” 

 

Blue nods. “Okay.”

 

“Are you?”

 

“Don’t turn this on me.”

 

Adam just glares.

 

Blue huffs and lies down on the floor. “Henry asked me out.”

 

“What the fuck?” The words slip out without Adam’s volition. 

 

“I know, right?”

 

He pokes Blue’s thigh. “Gansey’s boyfriend Henry asked you out?” 

 

Blue swats Adam’s hand away. “He asked me out on the behalf of both of them, genius.” 

 

There’s a lot to process there, so Adam begins with the easiest part. “Without Gansey?”

 

“Yeah, but we talked. Gansey called me after. It’s… it’s good.” 

 

Adam nearly comments on how rushed it seems, but once he thinks about it for a moment, it doesn’t seem rushed at all. Henry and Gansey have only been in Henrietta for two weeks, but it feels like a hundred times longer. Nothing forces people together like trauma and mortal danger, he supposes. He tugs on Blue’s arm so she sits up to face him. “They’re going to leave,” he finally points out. 

 

She nods. Her eyes are soft but defiant. “I know, Adam, but I think I’m tired of being sensible.”

 

That’s all Adam needs. He puts on his best shit-eating grin and asks, “How did Henry manage to get you to say yes?”

 

“Ugh, I never should have told you. If you must know,” she says, turning her nose up at Adam, “he took me out for gelato.”

 

“How _romantic_ ,” Adam teases, grinning wider than he has in what feels like ages.

 

“Shut _up,_ you ass. You’re not allowed to make fun of me. You’ve had a boyfriend for basically two years and I don’t think you’ve ever gone on a real date.” Before he can defend himself, she says, “Driving around in his stupid car doesn’t count.” 

 

Adam scoffs. “Whatever you say, Blue. Don’t think I haven’t heard Gansey’s end of your phone calls.” 

 

Blue glares. “It doesn’t count if we weren’t even— anything, yet.”

 

Adam barks out a laugh. “You weren’t _what_? Dating?” 

 

She deflates. Adam almost feels bad. Almost. “We’re not— we haven’t talked about anything like that. I don’t know.”

 

Adam hums thoughtfully. “Are you happy?”

 

She shrugs. “I think… I don’t know, with everything going on, it’s. I don’t know. But think it’s going to be a good thing.” Her face reddens inexplicably.

  
“What aren’t you telling me, _Jane_?”

 

Her pink cheeks turn bright red. “ _You!_ Shut up. They told me… they told me they planned to go on a road trip this summer. They asked me to come with them.” 

 

“Well?” 

 

“I said I’d think about it. But I want to.” She sighs. “I want to get out of here after this is all over.”

 

Adam finds, to his surprise, that he agrees. He’s always hated Henrietta, but the Barns was different. _Ronan_ was different. Now, though, the Barns feels more like a safe haven from the apocalypse than a home. 

 

“I’m happy for you.” He snickers. “You better keep the door open at the Barns, though.”

 

“I don’t know how many times I’ve walked in on you and Ronan in my house _alone_ , you of all people can’t complain.” She pauses and gives Adam a piercing look. “You’re not mad that we… you know, during all this?” She makes an all-encompassing gesture that Adam takes to mean _magic bullshit._  

 

He shrugs. “It’s nice to have something good happen.” 

 

Just then, a knock sounds at the door. “It’s us,” Gansey’s voice says, muffled by the wall between them. 

 

“Come in,” Blue replies. 

 

Gansey and Henry make themselves comfortable on Blue’s bed. Apprehensively, Gansey says, “We don’t have to do it, Adam. If it’s as dangerous as Calla says it is, then we’ll find another way.”

 

Adam’s hands clench into fists, knuckles white with tension. He says nothing. Just like that, his lightened mood has disappeared. 

 

How could Gansey think that? How could he possibly even consider not saving Ronan when they were so close? He feels his rage making itself known on his darkening expression, in his tense figure and sharpened eyes. Gansey’s face knits itself into something less worried and more empathetic. Empathy, Adam has learned, is just a step up from sympathy, and sympathy is only a hair away from pity. 

 

Blue looks between Adam and Gansey, possibly to gauge how the situation will play out. It’s also possible that it is something else entirely. Her mouth opens and closes a few times like she wants to say something, but keeps changing her mind at the last moment.

 

Adam stands up. He knows exactly what Blue is thinking. Why did she defend Adam to her family downstairs if she was just going to side against him now?

 

“You can’t say I’m being irrational because I’m… upset. Don’t patronize me.” He gives each of them a searching look. “Ronan is _dying_.” 

 

Gansey frowns. It looks plastic. “He’s missing.”

 

Adam laughs, just twice: _ha ha._ It sounds hollow, even to his own ear. “Ronan is not missing. We know exactly where he is. He’s in Cabeswater, which is dying,” he growls. “You know what happens when it finally dies and we still haven’t gotten him out?” 

 

Gansey doesn’t answer. Adam snarls, “Well? What happens, Dick?”

 

Gansey’s synthetic frown turns icy. “I’m not asking you to let him die, Adam. I’m asking you to make sure you both don’t end up in the grave, Christ almighty.”

 

This seems to be a recurring theme, Adam thinks. He’s quickly tiring of it. “If Ronan died when I could have done something about it but didn’t…” he trails off, letting the silence speak for him. If Ronan died while Adam sat around and waited, Adam wouldn’t survive it. Ronan dying or leaving would hurt more than Adam can imagine, but eventually, he’d be alright. However, there would be no coming back from Ronan dying if it was at Adam’s hands. 

 

“Ronan’s not going to die,” Blue hisses. “Sit down, Adam.”

 

Adam does not like to be so obviously placated. If Ronan were here, he’d shout back, and they would argue until the root of the problem was teased out of Adam’s bullshit. Ronan wouldn’t condescend. Blue gives him an exhausted, knowing look. “We’ve been over this. Wanting to yell at him about this doesn’t make you not have to talk to us.” 

 

Adam sits down.

 

It’s not that he means to keep thinking about Ronan, exactly. It’s just impossible not to when everything seems to lead back to him. He wishes that weren’t true; if Ronan wasn’t so intertwined with everything else going on, maybe it would hurt less. 

 

“I was thinking we could go exploring the caves,” Gansey says, breaking the uneasy silence. “The equipment I ordered came in this morning.”

 

Blue’s eyes widen. “You ordered spelunking equipment?” An expression that is part indignation and part frustration works its way onto her face. 

 

Gansey nods. “It’s brand new,” he says, as if that won’t make it worse. He appears to be blissfully oblivious to the transgression he’s committed. 

 

Blue scoffs. “That’s so much better! Brand new cave exploration equipment. Isn’t that just a valuable waste of money.”

 

Gansey frowns. “Do you not want to go?”

 

Blue huffs and throws her arms into the air. “Of course I want to go! But do you think I want my spelunking experience to hinge on whether or not you’re generous enough to gift us peasants with your shiny new equipment? Do you think you’re ever going to _use_ any of this again?”

 

Both Gansey and Blue look to Adam for help, but Adam refuses to get involved. He glares at Gansey to make his allegiance known, but his mind is stuck on the overuse of the word _spelunking_ and the jokes Ronan should be making about it. 

 

When Adam zones back in, the argument has fizzled out. Gansey looks thoroughly lectured and Blue looks thoroughly smug. “What exactly are we looking for in the caves?” Cheng asks, legs thrown haphazardly into Gansey’s lap. “What’s the point, if we can’t do the ritual? It’s not like Cabeswater’s down there. Are we spying on Piper?”

 

Gansey see-saws his hand and twists his face into an indecisive, hesitant shape. It doesn’t suit him. “I don’t think the ritual is entirely off the table yet.” 

 

Adam exhales sharply. He ran upstairs to escape this torturous conversation, but it keeps following him. He glowers at Gansey, curling his mouth cruelly. Voice caked in oversaturated sincerity, he says, “I’m ever so grateful for your generosity, Gansey.” He raises his voice when he calls out, biting and bitter, “He may deign to allow Ronan to live, ladies and gents! Fucking hallelujah!” Blue begins to protest, but he cuts her off. “I’ll be in the car.”

 

Adam knows he’s being unfair and irrational, but he doesn’t particularly care. Almost exactly two years ago, he sacrificed himself to Cabeswater without regard for the consequences and he turned out fine. (Of course, Ronan was so furious they didn’t speak for most of that summer, but everything turned out alright in the end. Ronan can get angry at him when he’s back in the right dimension.)

 

Gansey, Cheng, and Blue join him in the Hondayota a few minutes later. No one says a word as they drive back to the Barns, though Adam can tell Gansey and his polite nature are dying to apologize. At home, Gansey fetches his equipment and explains the safety precautions and what they should expect in the caves, but Adam tunes most of it out. 

 

Blue gets his attention when she says pointedly, “I don’t think we should go while Adam’s having a temper tantrum.”

 

Adam just stares at her. Even now, he yearns for Ronan’s presence at his side; half the reason they’re constantly attached at the hip is so that when someone crosses either Ronan or Adam, they’ll be on the receiving end of twin glares, double the retaliation. Alone, Adam feels childish under Blue’s scrutinizing gaze. Blue’s claims of Adam having a temper tantrum aren’t far off, though he won’t admit that. 

 

“Spit it out, Parrish,” Cheng says, cool and collected. “We have things to do, you know.”

 

Adam seethes. He doesn’t want to go exploring any fucking caves, he doesn’t want to do anything. He wants to go to sleep and end up in whatever dream Ronan is living in. He only realizes his breathing has become ragged when Blue makes an aborted movement toward him. “Fuck off,” he hisses, abruptly angry at everyone in the room, himself most of all. Why can’t he cope? Why can’t he just accept the fact that Ronan’s gone? Why could he survive everything else in his fucked-up life but this? 

 

“We are going to find out how to do the ritual,” Adam says calmly once his heart is no longer thundering out of his chest. “And then we’re going to prepare for it. If we find a safer way to get him back before the time comes, we’ll stop. But I’m not letting him die.”

 

Blue inclines her head, looking a little relieved. “I can live with that.” Gansey and Cheng nod in agreement.

 

Cheng spreads his arms and grins. “Now, _madame et messieurs,_ I think we have a cavern to spelunk.”

 

♕

 

Gansey leads the way with the most cave-exploring experience, and behind him, attached by a length of rope, is Blue, then Cheng, then Adam. Now that Adam is more in his right mind, the dark, grimy cave is infinitely creepier. It also appears to have changed since the day before; the way down is no longer straight and narrow. It follows about the same path, but it’s more difficult terrain and more dangerous and generally more cave-like. Adam can’t say it’s an experience he’d like to repeat. 

 

They reach a section Adam vaguely recognizes as the place where Adam saw Neeve and Piper. It’s oddly unchanged. They fall silent, unwilling to let the two women know they’re there, if they truly are still are on the other side of the hole. Blue finds a part of the cave wall that appears to be covered up on the other side by some sort of cloth. After finding it, though, they stay away from it. Any of their lights could shine through the fabric and alert Neeve and Piper to their presence. 

 

Adam leads them back in the direction they came from so they can speak without worrying about who will hear them. 

 

“This place is giving me the creeps. Why’s it so important for this ritual?” Blue asks, shivering. Cheng presses almost imperceptibly closer to her side. 

 

“It’s more potent if the ritual is performed somewhere… powerful. Namely, a ley line. However, we don’t have access to our ley line, so this will have to do,” Gansey explains. “We could do it somewhere else and have it just… not work, and then try again, but that would be a waste of time and resources.” 

 

“What does this ritual entail, exactly?” Cheng asks. “All you’ve said is that it’s dangerous.” 

 

“I didn’t quite understand it, but I’m sure it will make more sense to Adam if Calla recognized it. The purpose of the ritual is to take something from a dream, though most texts refer to it as making dreams come true. There are a number of details on how to do the ritual, but what happens between Adam going to sleep and bringing Ronan back is very unclear. There are trials of some sort, and nightmares were frequently mentioned. You can put those two and two together with that, I’m sure. The dangerous part is that it’s apparently nearly impossible to survive the trials. It would have to be, or else magic would be a lot more prevalent today than it is.” Gansey laughs awkwardly. “The _how_ will come later, when we know the when and where.” 

 

“What happens if Adam fails the trials?” Blue demands, face pinched into a grimace. 

 

“Either I end up stuck with Ronan, or I die,” Adam says, not making eye contact with her. “Probably the latter.” 

 

“So many people have tried this before?” Cheng asks. “And failed?”

 

Gansey nods. “Not so much recently, though. It’s not exactly easy, and most don’t really make the connection between ‘making your dreams come true’ and ‘Greywaren’, I suppose.” 

 

Blue gives Gansey a pointed look. “Has anyone succeeded, Gansey?”

 

He shakes his head. 

 

“Let’s just keep going,” Adam snaps. “You’re not backing out now.” 

 

They pass Neeve and Piper’s cave. It only gets creepier the farther down they travel, and Adam worries about getting lost, in spite of the fact that Blue is placing markers down every so often so they can find their way back later. Eventually, they come upon a vast cavern with a silvery pool in the middle. It’s a puddle, really, but something about it gives Adam the impression that it’s deeper than it looks. 

 

“I guess that solves that,” Gansey says absentmindedly, standing at the edge of the pool. It reflects the light of the flashlights like a mirror. It glows slightly, too, casting an eerie light across the cave. 

 

Blue joins him and peers into the strange liquid. “Solves what?”

 

Gansey lowers his voice to a whisper. “We need a mirror for the ritual, but the instructions there were a little confusing. Something about a sort of depth? It was difficult to translate that part. I’d assumed it was more to do with profundity, or acuity, perhaps, like a lens, but I see now it could be both.” 

 

“Someone’s using his SAT vocabulary,” Blue mutters. Gansey starts to reach down toward the pool, but she grabs his arm. “Are you stupid? You can’t just go around touching glowing silver water all willy-nilly.”

 

“Willy-nilly, huh,” Adam echoes, grinning. 

 

“Shut up.” She pulls Gansey away from the edge before he gives into temptation.

 

Cheng joins the others at the edge, but Adam hangs back a little. Cheng kicks a pebble into the pool and it disappears without so much as a ripple. “How fascinating. So we’re doing it here?” 

 

Gansey nods. “It appears so.”

 

“What will Adam have to do with that puddle, exactly?” Blue asks, gaze flickering between the pool and Adam. “Like, he’s not going to need to take a swim, right?”

 

Gansey winces. “Well…” 

 

Blue gawks. “What!”

 

“It’s not like I can change the ritual because we don’t like it! It makes sense, if you think about it. Adam has to go into his dreams, which are inside of his head. If you create a reflection of Adam in a mirror with something behind it like the pool, then ostensibly you have another Adam, ergo somewhere almost physical for him to travel to.” 

 

“Scientific,” Cheng remarks, staring into the silvery liquid.

 

Gansey shakes his head and grins brilliantly. “No, Henry. Magical.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comment, kudos, etc. I'm at beetlejeuse.tumblr.com. 
> 
> Up next: 
> 
>  
> 
> _Neeve is sick to death of Piper fucking Greenmantle._
> 
>  
> 
> _Her declining health is directly correlated to her incessant whining; the worse she feels, the more she runs her mouth. She quit her job so she wouldn’t arouse any more suspicion, which means not only do they no longer have a steady source of income for things like food, she’s around all the more often to talk Neeve’s ear off. She wonders if Piper being her first kill would be enough of a sacrifice for Cabeswater to cede its power to Neeve._
> 
>  
> 
> _Probably not, but she finds comfort in the thought._


End file.
